Most people are aware of the PPP loan program and the economic benefit provided through the forgiveness feature. What you may not know is that there are other economic stimulus components of the CARES Act that you could benefit from … but the timelines are short.
OCFS Funding: If you are a New York State childcare provider under Articles 43 or 47, there are monies available to cover personal supplies for children (e.g. art supplies) and PPE related costs to enable you to provide face to face services. The application is due by 5:00 pm on July 22, 2020 and you must begin providing in-person services by Wednesday, August 5th. The links to the application are below:
HHS Medicaid Funding: In March/April of 2020, HHS released certain Medicare funding to providers of Medicare services and reported that Medicaid funding would be available down the road. During June 2020, HHS announced $15 billion available to Medicaid providers who did not previously receive funding in March/April.
While there is no definitive guidance as to which providers qualify, the FAQs make qualification very broad. As a result, it appears that as long as a provider directly bills Medicaid, they are eligible (e.g. OPWDD and OASAS funded agencies, Early Intervention Providers, etc.). The first step of the application process is to obtain an Optum ID.
Once you have the Optum ID you can begin the initial application process. This will require you to provide your name and TIN number which is compared to a master list created by the State. If you are on the list, you can move to the second phase of the application process.
The purpose of the HHS funds is to assist providers with losses and to cover additional costs associated with the COVID pandemic (e.g. PPE, structural or configuration changes to offices or buildings, temporary space, etc.). These funds consider losses back to March 1st. In determining losses, you need to consider all sources of income including PPP loan forgiveness. To qualify, you must have a decline in revenue due to the Coronavirus (this can be compared to last year or compared to an original budget for the year). Unlike the PPP loans, there are no limits on nature of expenditures funds can be used to cover, and there is no endpoint. As long as you are losing money attributable to the pandemic, you can continue to cover the losses. You do not have to incur losses to cover COVID related expenses with the HHS funds.
Funding is 2% of revenue from 2019. The definition of revenue is somewhat vague, however, we are interpreting it to be clinical and therapeutic services. We are excluding educational services from the application process. As such, all EI services should be allowable, as they are considered medical in nature (if a child is Medicaid eligible, you could bill Medicaid). The 2% is all EI revenue and not just Medicaid funded EI.
The application requires a lot of information, so providers should start early as the application deadline is July 20th.
Kenneth R. Cerini, CPA, CFP, FABFA
Managing Partner
Ken is the Managing Partner of Cerini & Associates, LLP and is the executive responsible for the administration of our not-for-profit and educational provider practice groups. In addition to his extensive audit experience, Ken has been directly involved in providing consulting services for nonprofits and educational facilities of all sizes throughout New York State in such areas as cost reporting, financial analysis, Medicaid compliance, government audit representation, rate maximization, board training, budgeting and forecasting, and more.