“Assistance to Community Hospitals: The commission, in consultation with the center for health information and analysis shall consider measures to address price variation among hospitals and develop recommendations to provide relief for community hospitals that aligns with the cost containment efforts set forth in Chapter 224 of the Acts of 2014 and meets the criteria established by the Special Commission on Provider Price Variation.

In developing the recommendations, the commission shall, at a minimum, consider the following measures (i) reimbursing hospitals at no more than the 80th percentile of the state wide commercial relative price and no less than the 20th percentile of the statewide commercial relative price; (ii) establishing three hospital reimbursement tiers such that in one of the tiers hospital commercial rates may not increase in the future rate year above the carrier-specific weighted average rate for the current year, another tier limits hospital rate increases to no more than 1 per cent above the carrier-specific weighted average rate for the current year, and the third tier the hospital weighted average rate of change would not be limited; (iii) developing a target hospital rate distribution that establishes a baseline relative price and a maximum relative price, based on a carrier-specific relative price distribution.”