[BRIAN SANDOVAL PATRICK caTES. STATE OF NEVADA DEPARTMENT OF ADMINISTRATION ra Nevada: Victims of Crime Program Southern: Nevada’ 1030 E. Wiluam St Ste $00 (Carson City, Nevada 8070 1775} 087-8428 | Fax (775) 687-2811 woes g08 2200 8. Ranch Lite Vea Nevada 89302 (702 880-9740 | Bae (702) 486-2808 Tick Segerblom, Chair Senate Judiciary Committee Nevada Legislature Carson City, NV 89701 March 13, 2017 Dear Chairman Segerbiom and members of the Judiciary Committee, | am writing this letter concerning Assembly Bill 122, which affects the Nevada Vietims of Crime Program This bill would remove the limit on payments to non-US. Citizens. This bill would not only require us to accept undocumented immigrant claims, but would also require us to pay non-Citizen visitors from around the world, as Neva- da is the leading tourist destination in the world We already help undocumented immigrants. Any victim of Domestic Violence ‘Sexual Assault, Trafficking, Felonious Assault, etc. qualifies for a U Visa, as long as they are willing to assist law enforcement with the prosecution and investiga. ion of the crime. Their Gependent family members also qualify fora U Visa We have approved claims where the victim has applied for @ U Visa and we have used that factor to meet the residency requirement. Based on the percentages, on a pro-rata basis Nevada had 92 victims that qualify for a U Visa each year. The Annual Cap on U Visa's is 10,000 and Nevada's equals 92. We approved 38 claims and denied 54 claims submitted by undocumented vic- tims in 2016. The denied crimes were 16 Assaults 6 Domestic Violence5 DUI 2 Homicide 6 Other Vehicular Crimes 8 Sexual Assault 11 Robbery The other 20 claims reported as Victim Ineligible/Not Legal were denied on the basis of eligibility 4 Injured while incarcerated 22 Ineligible to file for assistance (suspect; not named in Police report; etc) 1 Not a pedestrian hit and run 3 Adult passenger of a DUI The Pew Research Center shows that 7.2% of our population in Nevada consists of undocumented immigrants. That was 190,000 people in 2010. Since we cur- Fently receive approximately 1 claim per 1,000 people (3,000 claims per 3,000,000 residents) | would estimate we might get 200 additional claims (200 claims total from 200,000 undocumented immigrants). We would have to add another bilingual Staff member to assist with translating claims and talking to victims, 80 we will have increased administrative exoenses. This does not count the rest of the worlds visitors, and who can guess the lan- Guages we would need to interpret to pay medical bills We have submitted a Fiscal Note for over $2 milion. This will rise dramatically when we are required to pay claims for non-citizens injured in Nevada The Victim of Crime Program has very healthy reserves. The reason our reserves are so high is because "Obamacare” allows hospitals to obtain retroactive Med- icaid coverage for qualified patients. Most of our victims obtain this retroactive coverage. so their medical expenses are being pai through the Medicaid pro- gram Ifthe Affordable Care Act is overturned or amended, our reserves could disap- ear quickly, so budgeting the expense of this proposed bill based on our current reserves is highly questionable. Sincerely Bryan A. Nix, Esq, Coordinator