Jesse Scheckner
Lawmakers just broke through an impasse on how much money to allocate for nursing home improvements under Florida’s next spending plan.
The Senate and House are setting aside nearly $137 million combined — $78.4 million and $58.4 million, respectively — for the state’s annual nursing home reimbursement rate adjustment through their end-of-budgeting “sprinkle lists.”
The sprinkle list, as its name suggests, is an assortment of supplemental funding initiatives the Legislature compiles as budgeting processes near closure to provide typically small apportionments (compared to other earmarks) to regional projects.
By that standard, the nursing home money — to be distributed across the state — is an outlier. It’s also notable for its size. The Senate funding is more than three times as much as the upper chamber’s next-biggest sprinkle list item. The House provided more than double its next-biggest item.
The funds come more than a month into protracted budget talks that required lawmakers to extend the 2025 Session and after the Senate and House were locked in disagreement about how much to provide nursing homes.
By June 4, the Senate had proposed reserving $62.75 million for long-term elderly care facilities. The House, meanwhile, offered nothing.
The “sprinkle list” provisions published Friday, which do not require cross-chamber agreement, include $18 million in recurring general revenue funds, $40.6 million in nonrecurring money and $78.2 million in federal trust fund cash.
Florida’s yearly adjustments to its Medicaid reimbursement rates for nursing homes is part of the state’s ongoing strategy to bolster the financial stability of long-term care facilities and enhance their residents’ quality of care.
While the $137 million now being set aside for that purpose seems generous, it’s roughly a quarter the increase Florida enacted in 2023, which amounted to about $470,000 per facility.
The state also increased the Quality Incentive Program Payment Pool that year from 6% to 9% of non-property-related payments, a change meant to reward facilities that meet certain quality benchmarks and encourage improvements in patient care.
Further, the Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA) increased Medicaid reimbursement rates for private duty nursing services in 2024 by 7.19%. The adjustment raised the hourly rate for registered nurse services from $30.07 to $32.23 and for licensed practical nurse services from $26.25 to $28.14.
There are 691 licensed nursing homes in Florida with close to 84,500 beds and an occupancy of about 85%, accommodating some 71,000 residents at any given time, according to AHCA. Florida also has 3,080 assisted living facilities with more than 106,000 beds.
Long-term care is a significant contributor to the state economy, supporting some 286,000 jobs and making an estimated $27 billion impact annually, the Florida Health Care Association found.
