2. It requires hospitals to submit to the Maine Health Data Organization their annual financial information using electronic standardized accounting template software designed by the Governor's Office of Health Policy and Finance and provided to hospitals by the Maine Health Data Organization.

3. It continues voluntary targets for hospitals for:

A. Hospital entity operating margins;

B. Cost increases for a mixed inpatient and outpatient measure; and

C. Cost increases for an inpatient-only measure.

The operating margin target is not more than 3%. The mixed inpatient and outpatient cost increase target is no more than the forecasted increase in the hospital market basket index for the coming federal fiscal year. The inpatient-only cost increase target will be negotiated between the Maine Hospital Association and the Governor's Office of Health Policy and Finance and determined no later than October 1, 2005.

4. It instructs the Maine Hospital Association and the Governor's Office of Health Policy and Finance to agree by January 1, 2006 on a timetable, format and methodology for the hospital association to measure and report on outpatient cost- efficiency. The methodology must use the ambulatory payment classification system as the unit of cost.

5. It requests that the Maine Hospital Association develop, by January 1, 2006, standardized definitions of various administrative cost categories that hospitals may use when establishing budgets and reporting spending on administrative costs.

6. It instructs the Governor's Office of Health Policy and Finance to convene a health care administrative streamlining work group to facilitate the creation and implementation of a single portal through which hospitals can access and transmit member eligibility, benefit and claims information from multiple insurers. The work group is directed to investigate funding mechanisms, including seeking outside funding for start-up and ongoing operational costs, with the intention that the portal become independent and sustainable over time, and ways to ensure that savings resulting from implementation of such a portal are passed on to purchasers in the form of rate reduction by