Health care coverage: essential health benefits.

Existing law, the Knox-Keene Health Care Service Plan Act of 1975, requires the Department of Managed Health Care to license and regulate health care service plans and makes a willful violation of the act a crime. Other existing law requires the Department of Insurance to regulate health insurers. Existing law requires an individual or small group health care service plan contract or health insurance policy issued, amended, or renewed on or after January 1, 2017, to include, at a minimum, coverage for essential health benefits pursuant to the federal Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Existing law requires a health care service plan contract or health insurance policy to cover the same health benefits that the benchmark plan, the Kaiser Foundation Health Plan Small Group HMO 30 plan, offered during the first quarter of 2014, as specified. This bill would express the intent of the Legislature to review California's essential health benefits benchmark plan and establish a new benchmark plan for the 2027 plan year. The bill would limit the applicability of the current benchmark plan benefits to plan years on or before the 2027 plan year. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.