No. SB 1290
Filed under Healthcare.
Recovery Residence Accountability and Protection Act; Citing this act as the “Recovery Residence Accountability and Protection Act of 2025”; revising legislative findings; requiring any person, entity, or organization that owns, operates, or manages a recovery residence to obtain and maintain certification through the Department of Children and Families; deleting a requirement that the certification program is voluntary; deleting obsolete language; specifying the criteria for active management of a recovery residence, etc.
Plain English Summary
AI-GENERATEDEvery recovery residence in Florida must now get certified through the Department of Children and Families; operating one without certification becomes unlawful, replacing a system where certification had only ever been voluntary.
Existing recovery residences get a grace period: they must apply for certification by January 1, 2027, and can keep operating conditionally while the application is pending, unless the state suspends or denies them.
Homes can no longer turn away someone solely for taking prescribed addiction medication, and can't rely on blanket no-medication policies. But abstinence-only programs may still exclude those patients if admitting them would fundamentally change the program.
Referrals between treatment providers and recovery residences now only require the residence to hold a valid certificate, no longer also proof that it has a certified administrator actively managing it.
AIAny person, entity, or organization that owns, operates, or manages a recovery residence must now get certified, and operating one without certification is unlawful. The old law only ever asked for voluntary certification.
AIThe statute's definition of what counts as a recovery residence now requires holding a valid certificate of compliance, folding the certification mandate directly into the term used throughout the chapter.
AIProviders referring patients to, or accepting referrals from, a recovery residence used to also have to confirm it was actively managed by a certified administrator. Now a valid certificate of compliance alone is enough.
AIA recovery residence may not turn away an applicant solely because they take a federally approved medication for treating a substance use disorder, adding an explicit nondiscrimination duty to the chapter.
AIThe credentialing entity the department approves to run certification must have demonstrated expertise in recovery housing operations and must be affiliated with a specific national organization, the National Alliance for Recovery Residences.
AILevel I recovery residences previously could only house people who had completed treatment and had 9 months of sobriety. The completed-treatment requirement is deleted, leaving only the sobriety length.
AILevel I housing was required to be democratically run by its own residents. It may now instead have a designated house manager or peer leader providing oversight, closer to how Level II already works.
AIDeletes specific carve-outs that had let providers under managing-entity contracts, and referrals made before July 2018 to a wholly owned subsidiary, sidestep the referral-prohibition rule.