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F I S C A L I M P A C T R E P O R T
SPONSOR A. Lujan
ORIGINAL DATE
LAST UPDATED
1/22/2007
HB 240
SHORT TITLE OUTPATIENT MEDICINE RESEARCH
SB
ANALYST McOlash
APPROPRIATION (dollars in thousands)
Appropriation
Recurring
or Non-Rec
Fund
Affected
FY07
FY08
$489.0
Recurring
General Fund
(Parenthesis ( ) Indicate Expenditure Decreases)
Relates to SB 84.
SOURCES OF INFORMATION
LFC Files
Responses Received From
Health Policy Commission (HPC)
New Mexico Higher Education Department (HED)
SUMMARY
Synopsis of Bill
House Bill 240 appropriates $489,000 from the General Fund in FY08 to the Board of Regents
of the University of New Mexico (UNM) for the New Mexico Health Sciences Center (HSC).
The funding is to sustain and improve research involving an outpatient medicine program and a
practice-based research network that provides continuing medical education, clinical research
and outreach programs for rural clinicians and to support retention of clinicians in underserved
areas.
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS
The appropriation of $489,000 contained in this bill is a recurring expense to the General Fund.
Any unexpended or unencumbered balance remaining at the end of FY 2008 shall revert to the
General fund.
pg_0002
House Bill 240 – Page
2
SIGNIFICANT ISSUES
House Bill 240 addresses a long standing, difficult problem in rural New Mexico with the short-
ages and availability of health care professionals. Almost every health professional that is li-
censed in New Mexico is in short supply in most rural locations of the state. This includes phy-
sicians, dentists, nurses, dental hygienists, physical therapists, pharmacists, radiological tech-
nologists, dieticians, optometrists, medical technologists, audiologists, occupational therapists,
mental health professionals, social workers, and EMT-Paramedics as well as others. 32 of our 33
counties are considered partial or complete Health Professional Shortage Areas using definitions
of shortage established by the federal government.
This request was not on the list of priority projects submitted by UNM Health Sciences Center to
the New Mexico Higher Education Department for review and was not included in the Depart-
ment’s funding recommendation for FY08.
RELATIONSHIP
HB 240, conceptually, is a duplicate of SB 84. If actual duplication is desired, either HB 240 or
SB 84 must be amended.
BM/mt