1. A. This section and Section 3230 of Title 70 of the Oklahoma Statutes shall be known and may be cited as the "Independent Living Act".

2. B. The purpose of the Independent Living Act shall be:

   1. 1. To ensure that eligible individuals who have been or are in the foster care program of the Department of Human Services due to abuse or neglect receive the protection and support necessary to allow the individuals to become self reliant and productive citizens through the provision requisite services that include, but are not limited to, housing, medical coverage and education; and
   2. 2. To break the cycle of abuse and neglect that obligates the state to assume custody of children.
3. C. Individuals eligible for services pursuant to the Independent Living Act include any individual up to twenty-one (21) years of age who has been in the custody of the Department of Human Services or a federally recognized Indian tribe due to abuse or neglect for any nine (9) of the twenty-four (24) months after the individual's sixteenth birthday and before the individual's eighteenth birthday.
4. D. Individuals who are eligible for services pursuant to the Independent Living Act and who are between eighteen (18) and twenty-one (21) years of age shall be eligible, when funds become available, for Medicaid coverage, provided such individuals were also in the custody of the Department of Human Services or a federally recognized Indian tribe on the date they reached eighteen (18) years of age. The Legislature directs the Oklahoma Health Care Authority to submit a State Medicaid Plan Amendment to the federal Health Care Financing Administration to provide medical coverage for such individuals to become effective fiscal year 2003.

Laws 2000, HB 2452, c. 374, § 38, emerg. eff. July 1, 2000; Amended by Laws 2001, HB 1298, c. 415, § 3, emerg. eff. June 5, 2001 (superseded document available).