Health task force to vote on recommendations March 7
by February 17, 2016 9:16 pm 137 views
After a year of consultants’ reports, expert testimony and long meetings, the Health Reform Legislative Task Force will vote on recommendations for legislation at its next meeting in preparation for a health care special session that will occur a month later.
The task force’s chairman, Sen. Jim Hendren, R-Sulphur Springs, said in an interview after Wednesday’s meeting that members will vote on recommendations March 7. Those recommendations will be translated into legislation by the Bureau of Legislative Research before the task force’s next meeting on March 29, when they will be further considered in preparation for a planned health care special session.
Earlier in the day, Gov. Asa Hutchinson said that session could occur “within 10 days” before the scheduled April 13 fiscal session, with his own legislative package ready about two weeks before that in mid-March.
The task force will be focused on two primary issues, including the one that was responsible for its creation. That would be Arkansas’ Medicaid expansion, which is now known as the private option but perhaps will be known as Arkansas Works.
The private option is the state’s program created in 2013 that uses federal Medicaid dollars to purchase health insurance for adult Arkansans with incomes up to 138% of the federal poverty level. It provides insurance for 200,000 Arkansans and has cut the amount of uncompensated care provided by hospitals. However, while it currently is funded almost entirely by the federal government, the state becomes responsible for 5% starting in 2017, which rises to 10% by 2020. Opponents say it’s unsustainable, that it creates a new entitlement, that it allows the federal government to dictate policy to Arkansas, and that it adds to the national debt.
It requires a three-fourths majority in the Legislature and barely passed in 2013 and barely survived the 2014 session. In 2015, Hutchinson persuaded legislators to fund the program through this year, when it ends, while the task force was created to consider a replacement in the context of overall health care reform.
Hutchinson’s replacement, Arkansas Works, would require beneficiaries to obtain health insurance through their employer when available, to be referred to work training, and to pay for up to $19 in premiums if their incomes are above 100% of the federal poverty level.
Hendren said that the committee’s recommendations will include Arkansas Works, with additions and maybe some changes. For example, the task force’s consultant, The Stephen Group, has recommended the state seek a single, “global waiver” from the federal government for the program’s provisions.
Legislators are also considering whether the Medicaid system should be based in part on a managed care model, where a private company would run parts of the program with financial risks and rewards based on how efficiently it controls costs. Hutchinson supports that model, but it is not part of his Arkansas Works package.
The Task Force’s hired consultant, The Stephen Group, said the state could save $1.5 billion over five years. Meanwhile, another model, “managed fee for service,” which would be a more cost-effective version of what is used now, could save about $1 billion over five years, according to the consulting group.