GA Code § 31-7-155 (2021)
2021 Georgia Code|Title 31 - Health|Chapter 7 - Regulation and Construction of Hospitals and Other Health Care Facilities|Article 7 - Home Health Agencies|§ 31-7-155. Certificates of Need for New Service or Extending Service Area; Exemption From Certificate

  No home health agency initiating service or extending the range of its service area shall be licensed unless the department determines, in accordance with Article 3 of Chapter 6 of this title and regulations pursuant thereto, that there is a need for said services within the area to be served. All home health agencies which were delivering services prior to July 1, 1979, and were certified for participation in either Title XVIII or Title XIX of the federal Social Security Act prior to such date shall be exempt from a certificate of need, except in those instances where expansion of services or service areas is requested by such home health agencies. Such exemption from a certificate of need shall extend to all areas in which a home health agency was licensed by the department to provide services on or before December 31, 1989, except as provided in subsection (b) of this Code section.   Concerning an exemption from a certificate of need pursuant to subsection (a) of this Code section, service areas which were the subject of litigation pending in any court of competent jurisdiction, whether by way of appeal, remand, stay, or otherwise, as of December 31, 1989, shall not be so exempt except as set forth in the final unappealed administrative or judicial decision rendered in such litigation.   Except with respect to a home health agency's service areas which were the subject of litigation pending in any court of competent jurisdiction as of December 31, 1989, the department shall not consider any request for or issue a determination of an exemption from a certificate of need pursuant to this Code section after December 31, 1989.    (Ga. L. 1980, p. 1790, § 8; Ga. L. 1990, p. 378, § 1; Ga. L. 1999, p. 296, § 22; Ga. L. 2008, p. 12, § 2-16/SB 433.)   Cross references.   - Powers and duties of counties relating to support of paupers, T. 36, C. 12.   U.S. Code.   - Titles XVIII and XIX of the federal Social Security Act, referred to in this Code section, are codified as 42 U.S.C. §§ 1395 et seq. and 1396 et seq., respectively.   JUDICIAL DECISIONS   Grandfather status not acquired.    - O.C.G.A. § 31-7-155 did not authorize a determination by the State Health Planning Agency (now Department of Community Health) that agencies which had not been servicing the geographic areas at issue prior to July 1, 1979, had nevertheless acquired grandfather status in such areas because the agencies would have been providing services there prior to such date had it not been for misdirection on the part of certain employees of the Department of Human Resources (now the Department of Community Health for these purposes). Chattahoochee Valley Home Health Care, Inc. v. Healthmaster, Inc., 191 Ga. App. 42, 381 S.E.2d 56, grant of cert. vacated, Healthmaster, Inc. v. Chattahoochee Valley Home Health Care, Inc., 259 Ga. 387, 385 S.E.2d 290 (1989), cert. denied, 493 U.S. 1079, 110 S. Ct. 1132, 107 L. Ed. 2d 1037 (1990).