Gregoire signs bill that may help get health care for all state residents

By Michelle Dupler, Herald staff writer

OLYMPIA -- Gov. Chris Gregoire signed a bill Monday that advocates say is a step toward providing health care to all Washingtonians by 2014.

But while some in Olympia have their eye on the long view, the state's Health Care Authority is figuring out how to drop 40,000 people from the Basic Health Plan by Jan. 1.

The authority is the state agency that oversees the state-funded Basic Health Plan. It provides coverage for people who make too much money to qualify for federally funded Medicaid coverage but who aren't insured through their employers, said Health Care Authority spokesman Dave Wasser.

"It is a very unique program," he said. "There are not a lot of states that take care of that gap."

The Legislature cut $236 million, or 43 percent, from the authority's budget for the 2009-11 biennium as part of $4 billion in program cuts throughout the state to help manage a $9 billion deficit.

The amount slashed translates into cutting about 40,000 people from the plan, which currently covers more than 100,000 people.

Another 18,000 people who qualify for the plan will have their applications frozen. And 7,000 more whose names have been added to a waiting list won't be evaluated for eligibility, Wasser said.

Some people on the Basic Health Plan may qualify for Medicaid, and the authority is trying to identify those people and get them on Medicaid. That should be done by June 20, and then the authority will know how many people it has to cut, Wasser said.

Yet to be decided is whether people will be cut based on income, length of time in the plan, or by lottery.

Basic Health currently is losing about 2,000 enrollees per month as people choose to leave. Those slots will be held open, Wasser said.

The agency also is looking at ways to streamline how it works to keep costs under control in hopes the program will be a healthy option again once the economy turns around, he said.

The longer-term picture is where Senate Bill 5945 comes in. It was introduced by Sen. Karen Keiser, D-Kent, to build upon a previous bill calling for an analysis of five health care reform proposals.

Among those was the creation of a Washington Health Partnership that's intended to make health care affordable and to insure all Washington residents not covered by another government plan.

According to a Senate staff report, the bill would create a work group to explore how to expand health care coverage and would direct the Health Care Authority and its parent agency, the Department of Social and Health Services, to apply to the federal government for permission to expand eligibility requirements.

Members of the Healthy Washington Coalition praised the bill as an important step toward guaranteeing affordable health care for all Washingtonians.

"So many people have worked hard for this commitment from our elected leaders," said Robby Stern, coalition chairman. "And our work is not done. In fact it's far from done. But we're celebrating this next step in the process of reform and then getting back to the work at hand."

Opponents have criticized the plan as ineffective if the intention is to reduce health care costs, preferring instead to explore a free market solution that spurs competition among private insurers and health care providers.

Rep. Bill Hinkle, R-Cle Elum, minority whip and a member of the House Health Care and Wellness Committee, said the bill just creates another layer of bureaucracy that will discourage the private health care sector and allow the truly vulnerable to fall through the cracks.

"It is another punt because they don't have the money to do the state health care system the way they want it," Hinkle said.

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Tuesday, May. 19, 2009

Gregoire signs bill that may help get health care for all state residents

By Michelle Dupler, Herald staff writer