Section 1 Short title
This Act may be cited as the “Strengthening the Public Health Workforce Act”.
Strengthening the Public Health Workforce Act
A BILL
To improve the public health workforce loan repayment program.
Sec. 2 Public health workforce loan repayment program
Section 776 of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C. 295f–1) is amended—
in subsection (a)—
by striking “supply of” and inserting “supply of, and encourage recruitment of,”; and
by striking “Federal,”;
in subsection (b)—
in paragraph (1)(A)—
by striking “accredited academic educational institution in a State or territory in the final year” and inserting “institution of higher education in the final semester (or equivalent)”;
by striking “or health professions degree or certificate” and inserting “degree, a health professions degree, or a degree in computer science, information science, information systems, information technology, or statistics”;
by striking “Federal,”; and
by adding “or” after the semicolon at the end;
in paragraph (1)(B)—
in clause (i)—
by striking “accredited educational institution in a State or territory” and inserting “institution of higher education”; and
by striking “or health professions degree or certificate” and inserting “degree, a health professions degree, or a degree in computer science, information science, information systems, information technology, or statistics”; and
in clause (ii), by striking “Federal,”; and
in paragraph (4), by striking “section 455(m), 428J, 428K, 428L, or 460” and inserting “section 428K or 428L”;
in subsection (c)—
in paragraph (1), by striking “or certificate”; and
in paragraph (2)—
by striking “Federal,”; and
by striking “equal to the greater of—” and all that follows through the end of subparagraph (B) and inserting “of at least 2 consecutive years;”;
in subsection (d)—
by amending paragraph (1) to read as follows:
“(1) In general—A loan repayment provided for an individual under a written contract under the Program shall consist of payment, in accordance with paragraph (2), for the individual toward the outstanding principal and interest on education loans incurred by the individual in the pursuit of the relevant degree in accordance with the terms of the contract.”
in paragraph (2)—
by striking “For each year” and inserting the following:
“(A) In general—For each year”
by adding at the end the following:
“(B) Considerations—The Secretary may take action in making awards to ensure that—
“(i) not less than 50 percent of contracts under subsection (c) are awarded to individuals, who at the time of entering into the contract, are not employed by a local, State, or tribal public health agency or a related training fellowship, as recognized by the Secretary; and
“(ii) the contracts provided under subsection (c) are equitably distributed among—
“(I) the geographical regions of the United States; and
“(II) local, State, and tribal public health departments.”
by amending paragraph (3) to read as follows:
“(3) Tax treatment of payments—For purposes of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, a payment made under this section shall be treated in the same manner as an amount received under section 338B(g), as described in section 108(f)(4) of such Code.”
in subsection (e)—
by striking “receiving a degree or certificate from a health professions or other related school” and inserting “with a contract to serve under subsection (c)”; and
by inserting “or extended” after “postponed”;
by redesignating subsection (g) as subsection (h);
by inserting after subsection (f) the following:
“(g) Definitions—In this section:
“(1) Institution of higher education—The term institution of higher education has the meaning given the term in section 101 of the Higher Education Act of 1965.
“(2) Full-time—The term full-time, with respect to employment, means employment—
“(A) with a single qualifying employer for not less than 30 hours per week; or
“(B) with 2 or more qualifying employers for a total of not less than 30 hours per week.
“(3) Education loan—The term education loan means—
“(A) any loan made, insured, or guaranteed under part B, D, or E of title IV of the Higher Education Act of 1965;
“(B) any loan made under subpart II of part A of this title or part E of title VIII;
“(C) a private education loan, as defined in section 140 of the Truth in Lending Act; or
“(D) any other loan funded, insured, or guaranteed by any Federal agency that is not the Department of Education and that is issued directly to a student.”
in subsection (h), as so redesignated, by striking “$195,000,000 for fiscal year 2010, and such sums as may be necessary for each of fiscal years 2011 through 2015” and inserting “$200,000,000 for each of fiscal years 2020 through 2025”.