Legislative Priorities

NAEMT reviews and monitors all federal legislative initiatives that impact EMS and determines if these bills should be supported by the association, and if so, at what level. The Board has established the following system for designating and implementing NAEMT’s level of support for pending federal legislation or regulation:|

Level	Action
Actively Support	Post level of support on Capwiz legislation page.  Send letter of endorsement to bill sponsors and post on NAEMT website. Other actions may include: initiate or participate in Capwiz campaign, send NAEMT representatives to D.C. to personally advocate, ask state advocacy coordinators to visit congressional district offices.
Support	Post level of support on Capwiz legislation page.
Watch	None
Oppose	Post level of support on Capwiz legislation page.
Actively Oppose	Post level of support on Capwiz legislation page.  Send letter of opposition to bill or regulation to sponsors and post on NAEMT website.  Other actions may include: initiate or participate in Capwiz campaign, send NAEMT representatives to D.C. to personally advocate, ask state advocacy coordinators to visit congressional district offices.
Actively Support with Qualifications	May post level of support on Capwiz, depending on the types of qualifications. Send letter to bill sponsors explaining our position on the bill and post on NAEMT website.  Other actions may include: sending NAEMT representatives to D.C. to explain our position to members of Congress.

 

For a complete listing all of pending EMS legislation, click here.

NAEMT is actively supporting the following bills introduced in the 112th Congress. (Note:  bills that begin with the letter "S" refer to bills introduced in the U.S. Senate. Bills that begin with "H.R." refer to bills introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives. To read a full version of the bill, click the bill number.)

Medicare reimbursement for ambulance services

S.424 -- Medicare Ambulance Access Preservation Act of 2011- to preserve access to ambulance services under the Medicare program.

H.R. 1005 -Medicare Ambulance Access Preservation Act of 2011 - to preserve access to ambulance services under the Medicare program.

S. 1680 - Craig Thomas Rural Hospital and Provider Equity Act of 2011 - protect and preserve access of Medicare beneficiaries in rural areas to health care providers under the Medicare program.

 

Public Safety Officers Benefit program

H.R. 4018 -- Public Safety Officers' Benefits Improvement Act - to improve the Public Safety Officers' Benefits program and include nonprofit and volunteer ground and air ambulance crew members and first responders for certain benefits.
S.1696 -- Public Safety Officers' Benefits Improvements Act  - to improve the Public Safety Officers’ Benefits Program and include nonprofit and volunteer ground and air ambulance crew members and first responders for certain benefits.

 

Field EMS quality
H.R.3144 -- Field EMS Quality, Innovation, and Cost Effectiveness Improvements Act of 2011 - to provide for improvement of field emergency medical services, and for other purposes.  Read a one page summary of this bill here.

 

Support for military medics

H.R. 4124 -- Emergency Medic Transition (EMT) Act - to provide grants to State emergency medical service departments to provide for the expedited training and licensing of veterans with prior medical training.

S.1553 -- Veterans to Paramedics Transition Act -to allow EMS agencies currently receiving rural emergency medical service training and equipment grants to use grant funds for training to enable military veterans to satisfy emergency medical services certification requirements, as determined by their state.

 

Honoring fallen first responders

H.R.1330 -- Honoring Hometown Heroes Act - to provide for the flying of the flag at half-staff at half-staff in the event of the death of a first responder in the line of duty.