How About An Insurance Department Compromise?

The scuttlebutt this morning is that lawmakers have been negotiating all night on a resolution to their stalemate on the Insurance Department budget, which has been tripped up by a minority of House members opposed to $1 million in funding for federal health care reform.

This morning, several lawmakers say that an agreement hasn’t been reached.

But a possible path to victory for all sides could exist.

HB 2138 by Rep. Fred Allen (D-Little Rock) is the controversial measure that would give Insurance Commissioner Jay Bradford regulatory authority to move forward with the state’s implementation of federal health care reform.

Allen thinks he has the votes to squeak the measure through the House, but he’s not sure about the Senate.

Of course, HB 1226, the Insurance Department budget bill, which has the $1 million federal grant to plan for the health insurance exchanges, can’t muster 75 votes in the House for passage and a three-fourths majority in the Senate is dubious.

Two GOP legislators opposed to the exchanges and the money in the agency’s budget said their votes to allow Insurance Department funding could be swayed if Allen’s bill is sent to interim study. With the votes for passage questionable, that may be the fate of Allen’s bill anyway.

By sending HB 2138 to interim study in exchange for funding HB 1226, all sides could claim victory. The GOP members against health care reform get to slow down the pace of health care reform and are provided a forum for monitoring the Insurance Commissioner’s progress towards a 2013 deadline.

The Insurance Department gets the money to at least pay for overhead for the interim study and is allowed to continue planning for state implementation of the federal law albeit at a less aggressive pace than it might want. Of course, Allen’s bill was amended to abort the state’s efforts if federal health care reform is struck down or repealed.

Is this a reasonable solution where all sides claim a win-win? Sure. And it recognizes the political realities that both sides can’t win with straight up-and-down votes.