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Page 3 of 12 § 10:71-2.3 Policy and procedure on prompt disposition Medicaid application was properly denied over the applicant's claim that the deadline should have been extended to allow him to provide requested items because the agency in fact had extended the deadline for receipt of the requested items from July 19 to December 13, and the applicant still failed to provide the needed documentation. M.S. v. Gloucester Cnty., Bd. of Soc. Servs., OAL DKT. NO. HMA 02481-18, 2018 N.J. AGEN LEXIS 794, Final Agency Determination (June 25, 2018). Lawyers who were conservators for an elderly man who was applying for Medicaid nursing home disabled benefits were acting in good faith to transmit all required documentation to a county social services board and their conduct also reflected cooperation and proactive efforts to comply with the board's requests. Those efforts constituted "exceptional circumstances" within the meaning of Medicaid Communication 10-09 and justified an order reversing the benefit denial and requiring a review of the application. H.P. v. Ocean Cnty. Bd. of Social Servs., OAL DKT. NO. HMA 01118-18, 2018 N.J. AGEN LEXIS 271, Initial Decision (May 11, 2018). DMAHS Director reversed an ALJ's Initial Decision in favor of a Medicaid applicant and reinstated an agency ruling denying benefits on the ground that the applicant failed to provide the needed information prior to the date on which benefits were denied and that the determination notice issued by the agency sufficiently set out the action that the agency was taking, the rationale therefor and the statutes that supported the proposed action. D.C. v. DMAHS, OAL DKT. NO. HMA 06870-17, 2017 N.J. AGEN LEXIS 1310, Final Agency Determination (December 7, 2017). Determination of county social services board denying a Medicaid application made on behalf of a disabled woman who died during the pendency of the proceedings was rejected by an ALJ on findings that the board failed to comply with the 90-day statutory time frame for decision, failed to advise the applicant's representative as to why the application was not being determined on a timely basis, allowed 570 days to elapse between the date of application and the date of denial, and otherwise failed to comply with its obligations vis-a-vis the application. D.C. v. Burlington Cnty. Bd. of Social Servs., OAL DKT. NO. HMA 6870-17, 2017 N.J. AGEN LEXIS 727, Initial Decision (September 18, 2017). Failure on the part of an applicant for Medicaid Nursing Home Benefits to timely provide requested financial documentation needed to establish eligibility provided grounds for a determination denying benefits to the applicant. The regulation's use of the word "may" demonstrated that the agency had the discretion to either put the application into pending status or not, and the exhibition of a purported "spirit of cooperation" on the part of the applicant did not obviate the agency's ability to issue a denial letter where, as here, the applicant continued to fail to provide financial information as requested. E.Z. v. Bergen Cnty. Bd. of Social Servs., OAL DKT. NO. HMA 07334-17, 2017 N.J. AGEN LEXIS 728, Initial Decision (September 15, 2017). Medicaid application for a husband who was separated from his wife was properly denied because the husband failed to document any efforts that he ostensibly had made to obtain financial data possessed by his wife. Even though the husband insisted that he could not obtain any information from her, the husband lived next door to the wife, the husband was responsible for the couple's children, the wife had signed a contract obligating her to provide medical care to the husband and the couple had a joint checking account, jointly owned real estate and had filed a joint Chapter 7 case. R.W. v. Somerset Cnty. Bd. of Social Servs., OAL DKT. NO. HMA 17759-16, 2017 N.J. AGEN LEXIS 691, Initial Decision (September 13, 2017). The agency's failure to comply with the regulatory deadlines for the processing of a Medicaid application notwithstanding, the applicant did not comply with proper requests for documentation concerning a special needs trust and certain insurance and annuity policies with the result that the agency could not verify the applicant's resources and properly denied the application on that basis. K.S. v. DMAHS, OAL DKT. NO. HMA 14539-16, 2017 N.J. AGEN LEXIS 705, Initial Decision (September 7, 2017). County social services board did not comply with its obligations to process a Medicaid application within 45 days nor did it provide a reason for delaying its processing of the applicant's application, thereby violating governing law. However, its determination granting retroactive coverage only for two of three months was proper because the