On August 12, 2009, the Department of Public Instruction received a complaint under state and federal special education law from xxxxx against the Westby Area School District. This is the department’s decision regarding that complaint. The issue is whether the school district, during the 2008-2009 school year, properly obtained parental consent before access to Medicaid was sought. On August 27, 2009, the department received notification the parties agreed to participate in mediation relating to the issue in the complaint and requested an extension of the 60-day time limit to complete the complaint investigation. On October 28, 2009, department staff was informed the parties were unable to resolve the issue through mediation.
A district may not submit interim bills to Medicaid for covered services in a student’s individualized education program (IEP) unless, and until, parental consent for billing is obtained. The district acknowledges that during the 2008-2009 school year it did not obtain the parents’ consent prior to interim claim billing under the School-Based Services (SBS) program. Within 30 days from the date of the decision, the district must submit a corrective action plan to ensure parental consent is obtained prior to interim claim billing.
All noncompliance identified above must be corrected as soon as possible, but, in no case, more than one year from the date of this decision. This concludes our review of this complaint.
//signed CST 11/13/09
Carolyn Stanford Taylor
Assistant State Superintendent
Division for Learning Support: Equity and Advocacy
Dec/pmw