Advocating for Rural Hospitals
This week, I introduced the Rural Emergency Hospital Improvement Act, legislation that would expand access to federal resources for rural hospitals through the Rural Emergency Hospital (REH) Medicare designation. The REH Improvement Act would increase opportunities for Critical Access Hospitals (CAH) and rural hospitals to convert to an REH and make technical improvements to the designation. These changes would help make the conversion to an REH more appealing by giving rural hospitals facing closure access to critical resources from the federal government to remain open. Created as part of the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021, REH is a new Medicare provider designation that offers certain rural hospitals the opportunity to convert and continue operating with limited services rather than closing.

The provisions in the bill include allowing previously closed rural hospitals to re-open and apply for the REH designation if they can demonstrate they met all eligibility requirements between January 1, 2015, and December 27, 2020. REH facilities would also be allowed to maintain or develop distinct part units for inpatient psychiatric care, obstetrics care and allow limited inpatient rehabilitation services.

Access to emergency health care saves lives and helps keep rural communities prospering. REH designation has already helped save numerous rural hospitals, and expanding access to this successful program is a common-sense way to make certain more hospitals stay open. I am ready to work with my colleagues in the Senate and the House of Representatives to get this bill across the finish line and protect more rural hospitals from closure.

Read more about this legislation in KSRL, here.

National Police Week
During this National Police Week, I spoke on the Senate floor to honor Fairway Police Officer Jonah Oswald and all the law enforcement officers who have passed away in the line of duty. During this week, we will memorialize the 282 heroes who, during the last year, gave their lives serving their communities. One of those heroes is Kansas Officer Jonah Oswald. In August of last year, Officer Oswald was fatally shot while responding to another department’s request for help. Officer Oswald was just 29 years old and was a husband and father to two young boys. He served for four years in the Fairway Kansas Police Department.

Now more than ever, it takes a special kind of person to be a law enforcement officer. Whether sheriff’s deputies or detectives, local police, tribal police or highway patrol officers, beat cops or federal agents, the Kansas Bureau of Investigation, we hold up those who wear the badge and honor them today as we should every day. May God bless our law enforcement and their families. May they be safe from harm as they defend and protect the communities in which they serve and live. As Vice Chair of the Appropriations Subcommittee that funds our national law enforcement officers, it is an honor and privilege to be associated with those who are willing to sacrifice so much for the benefit of all of us.

You can watch my floor remarks here.