I 111th CONGRESS 2d Session H. R. 6346 IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES September 29, 2010 Mr. Kind (for himself and Mr. Graves of Missouri) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Ways and Means A BILL To amend title XVIII of the Social Security Act to treat certain provider taxes as allowable costs for purposes of Medicare reimbursements to critical access hospitals.

1.

Short title

This Act may be cited as the Rural Hospital Protection Act.

2.

Certain provider taxes treated as allowable costs for purposes of Medicare CAH reimbursements

Section 1861(v)(1) of the Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. 1395x(v)) is amended by adding at the end the following new subparagraph: (W)In determining such reasonable costs for critical access hospitals with respect to cost reporting periods beginning on or after January 1, 2004, the Secretary shall include as allowable costs any health care related taxes, as defined in section 1903(w)(3). In computing the reasonable costs with respect to such health care related taxes for purposes of the previous sentence, the Secretary shall not offset against the amount of the tax assessments paid by a critical access hospital any amounts that the critical access hospital receives from a State if the Secretary has not determined that there is in effect a hold harmless provision, as described in section 1903(w)(4), with respect to the health care related tax. .