The Alabama Department of Revenue (“Department”) recently issued a proposed regulation, Prop. Ala. Admin. Code 810-6-5-.05.02 which, if approved, will dramatically alter the obligation of sellers to collect and remit local sales and use tax imposed by Alabama cities and counties. By regulatory fiat, not supported by legislative changes, the Department seeks to reverse decades of tax history and positions ...
On March 11, 2014, Alabama formally created an independent tax tribunal and implemented additional procedural changes through the enactment of the Alabama Taxpayer Fairness Act (“Act”), which becomes effective October 1, 2014. The Alabama Senate approved legislation creating the Act on February 27, followed by House approval on March 4 and formal enactment by Governor Robert Bentley on March 11 ...
As we stated in our bulletin last week, on March 31st, the federal government outlined proposed actions relating to Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs), a key component of the healthcare reform legislation (the Affordable Care Act, or ACA) enacted in March 2010. In this bulletin, we provide some additional information regarding each of the March 31st releases ...
Today the federal government released final rules for the formation and operation of Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) under the Medicare Shared Savings Program. The regulations initially proposed in March 2011 generated considerable attention and comment as ACOs represent a key component of the Affordable Care Act, the healthcare reform legislation enacted in 2010 ...
Rural and community hospitals could fill a major gap in a healthcare system that will likely be overloaded, in varying degrees, for at least the next 18 months due to the COVID-19 global pandemic. Congress is in the process of passing the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (“the Cares Act”) that provides unprecedented relief designed to help business in general, but specific allocations for hospitals ...
For the first time, the Nasdaq has allowed common shares of a Canadian cannabis cultivator, Cronos Group Inc., to be cross-listed on the Nasdaq Global Market. This cross-listing for Cronos (TSX-V: MJN; Nasdaq: CRON) marks the first time a cannabis cultivator was allowed to list on any U.S. exchange. In 2015 and 2016, Nasdaq famously rejected the Colorado cannabis-focused social media company MassRoots Inc ...
Apparently, the OCR has a different concept of the holiday spirit than many others do. On December 22, OCR announced the 13th settlement agreement related to its Right of Access Initiative. This time, the provider settled for $36,000 and agreed to enter into a corrective action plan. This latest matter involved Peter Wrobel, M.D., P.C., d/b/a Elite Primary Care ("Elite"). The situation follows a very familiar pattern: a patient requested records but did not receive them ...
On April 1, 2020—the effective date of the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA)—the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) issued temporary regulations to interpret and enforce the landmark legislation passed by Congress “to assist working families facing public health emergencies” arising out of the COVID-19 pandemic ...
CMS recently announced yet another delay to the full implementation of “two midnight rule,” which revises its longstanding guidance to hospitals and physicians relating to when hospital inpatient admissions are deemed to be reasonable and necessary for payment under Medicare Part A. Specifically, this latest “delay” is the result of CMS’s extension of the “Probe & Educate Period,” a period of partial non-enforcement for the two midnight rule requirements, until September 30, 2014 ...
On October 20th, the federal government released a final rule and other companion releases relating to Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) under the Medicare Shared Savings Program (MSSP), a key component of the Affordable Care Act enacted in March 2010. The proposed rule, issued in March 2011, generated extensive comment from the healthcare industry ...
The impact of COVID-19 and the economic downturn has pressured independent hospitals, rural hospitals and smaller health systems in particular. Despite the immense challenges, independent facilities and their Boards should take this time to best position for the near- and long-term. In light of this, Waller partnered with Kaufman Hall to develop a guide for healthcare leaders, The Health System Growth Imperative: Charting Opportunities During the Pandemic and Beyond ...
Amid the unprecedented changes wracking the business world in 2020, one certainty remains: many industries will look very different in future years as strategic responses to COVID-19 gain traction and become permanent. In the healthcare REIT sector, we are beginning to see trends that may shape industry norms long after the dust has settled from the chaos of 2020. 1 ...
You may have heard something about GDPR lately and thought "Why should I care? It probably won't affect me or my business.” In reality, the implications of GDPR are far-reaching. The European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is a set of regulations strengthening data privacy and protection laws for residents of the EU. The regulations take effect in just two months: May 25, to be exact ...
The Budget. The 83rd Texas Legislative Session convened on January 8th with news of a better-than-anticipated revenue estimate, an unusually high number of new and second-term legislators, and less controversy and fanfare than observers have come to expect at the start of the biennial, 140-day process. In mid-March, only days before the bill became due, lawmakers passed and the Governor signed legislation to fill the $4 ...
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has opened up another $20 billion in funds to help hospitals and healthcare providers deal with the financial impacts of treating COVID-19 patients. The new funding round was opened on April 25 and is intended to compensate providers without regard to payer mix and to provide assistance based on March and April 2020 lost revenues ...
With the twelfth anniversary of the implementation of the Sarbanes Oxley Act of 2002 (“SOX”) swiftly approaching, it may or may not be coincidental that the SEC has been involved in several SOX-related enforcement actions recently, including (i) bringing charges against the CEO and former CFO of a Florida-based computer equipment company for misrepresenting the state of its internal controls over financial reporting and (ii) awarding more than $400,000 to a whistleblower who reported fra
At this year’s annual meeting of the National Association of Addiction Treatment Providers in Austin, there was a clear divide on display between the “old school” and the “new school” during a session on electronic marketing strategies. The number of residential addiction treatment providers operating in the United States has exploded since the passage of the Affordable Care Act in March 2010 ...
On May 5, 2016, the White House issued a report citing a variety of issues with the use of non-compete agreements advocating for non-compete reform at the state and federal level.1 According to the White House report, with respect to healthcare services (i.e., physicians, nurses, psychologists, social workers and other medical professionals), noncompetes have the potential to interfere with the quality of care by restricting consumer choice ...
I’ve had bad experiences with water. Pouring out of broken washers and gushing from burst pipes, water has repeatedly defied my attempts to keep it contained. But I need water, so I maintain my plumbing, use water sensibly, and, if I suffer a leak, I clean up the mess and go on. Why am I talking about water? Modern businesses need data, like we need water ...
In a precedential decision (June 7, 2016), the U.S. Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (Board) held that when a petitioner files a petition to cancel an existing registration when the registration is less than five years old, the five-year bar in the Lanham Act Section 14 (15 U.S.C. Section 1064) is tolled for the purpose of adding an additional claim against that registration.Ashland Licensing & Intellectual Property LLC v. Sunpoint International Group USA Corp ...
The application of distributed ledger, or blockchain, technology has permeated many industries. Since its debut through cryptocurrency, many companies have embraced its potential and many more are actively identifying and implementing novel use cases. The health care industry is no different, and blockchain technology is currently being used for physician and nurse credentialing, electronic medical records (EMRs), patient engagement, patient identity, and pharma supply chain management ...
Governance and social factors play a significant role in determining a hospital’s openness to change and its ability to complete a business transaction, be that a merger, acquisition, or other strategic partnership. For government-owned hospitals, tension between the goals of government entities and the goals of a hospital’s board, in addition to added legal complexities, may result in failed or generally avoided transactions ...
It goes without saying that a lender must work to maximize its recovery when a borrower is in default and has no reasonably realistic or meaningful way to cure the default. This scenario far too often forces a lender to determine the most efficient and effective method to sell its collateral ...
Although its emergence on the business scene is fairly recent, the Series LLC has been gaining popularity as a business entity. Under the Series LLC umbrella, this entity is able to create multiple Protected Series, each with its own separate rights, powers, assets, obligations, business purposes and associated members ...
