As Introduced

136th General Assembly

Regular Session S. B. No. 296

2025-2026

To amend section 5163.33 of the Revised Code to declare the General Assembly's intent to increase the Medicaid personal needs allowance for residents of nursing homes and ICFs/IID.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF OHIO:

Section 1. That section 5163.33 of the Revised Code be amended to read as follows:

Sec. 5163.33. (A) In determining the amount of income that a medicaid recipient must apply monthly toward payment of the cost of care in a nursing facility or ICF/IID, a county department of job and family services shall deduct from the recipient's monthly income a monthly personal needs allowance in accordance with the "Social Security Act," section 1902(q), 42 U.S.C. 1396a(q).

(B) In the case of a resident of a nursing facility, the monthly personal needs allowance shall be not less than fifty dollars for an individual resident and not less than one hundred dollars for a married couple if both spouses are residents of a nursing facility and their incomes are considered available to each other in determining eligibility.

(1) Prior to January 1, 2016, forty dollars unless the resident has earned income, in which case the monthly personal needs allowance shall be determined by the department of medicaid, or the department's designee, but shall not exceed one hundred five dollars;

(2) For calendar year 2016 and each calendar year thereafter, not less than fifty dollars for an individual resident and not less than one hundred dollars for a married couple if both spouses are residents of an ICF/IID and their incomes are considered available to each other in determining eligibility.

(D) It is the intent of the general assembly that beginning on the effective date of this amendment, the medicaid director shall increase the amounts specified in divisions (B) and (C) of this section to not less than seventy-five dollars for an individual resident and not less than one hundred fifty dollars for a married couple. Thereafter, on the thirtieth day of each September, the director shall increase those amounts effective the following January first. The amount of the increase shall be equal to the percentage increase, if any, in the consumer price index from the average of the third quarter of the year in which the calculation is being made to the average of the third quarter of the previous year. The medicaid director shall round the percentage increase to the nearest one-tenth of one per cent. If no increase in that index occurs, the medicaid director shall not increase the amount.

Section 2. That existing section 5163.33 of the Revised Code is hereby repealed.