Budget battle centers on familiar Medicaid question: Who pays?
When lawmakers return to the state Capitol on May 26 to resume negotiations on a new $5 billion state budget for the fiscal year that begins July 1, they will face the same major decision that’s been on the table for more than six months: the decision of just who will pay for the state’s portion of the Medicaid program.
In his revised Fiscal Year 2010 executive budget recommendation, Gov. Haley Barbour repeated his call for a $90 million hospital assessment as a bedrock financing method for the state’s portion of the Medicaid program. The federal-state program provides health care for poor children, the blind, the disabled and the elderly.
House Speaker Billy McCoy said flatly on Thursday that he didn’t “believe the House would pass a hospital tax at $90 million.”
“But I believe we are moving toward a meaningful compromise with the Senate and that we will ultimately be able to craft a good budget,” said McCoy.
But without the $90 million hospital tax, Barbour said the entire Medicaid program will be in danger of historic budget cuts in the midst of a recession.
Clarion-Ledger
5/11/9
Magnolia Tribune
