Medicaid budget set, will rise 8.7% next year in state funds

One of the biggest single budgets in state government, for Medicaid, will be pegged at $474.2 million in state funds for next year, $1.9 billion in total funds, the Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee decided this morning on a unanimous, 18-0 vote. That’s an 8.7 percent increase in state funding from this year, 5.7 percent in total funds, and includes the $1.55 million that’s being restored to Medicaid by reversing three of this year’s service cuts for disabled people on the program, as called for in a bill that passed the House yesterday. The restoration of that $1.55 million in state funds will bring $3.76 million in federal matching funds into Medicaid next year. The federal government funds more than 70 percent of Medicaid, Idaho’s health care program for the poor and disabled; the federal-funds portion of the Medicaid budget for next year is $1.2 billion.

The state-funds increase includes $36.4 million to cover part of the Medicaid budget that for the past two years was covered by assessments on hospitals, nursing homes and intermediate-care facilities to keep the state from losing even more federal matching funds during its budget crunch.

Rep. Wendy Jaquet, D-Ketchum, noted that the service cuts that are being reversed address major concerns raised by those testifying at this year’s big public hearing on the state funding. One eliminates a new rule that forced patients with both developmental disabilities and mental illness to choose one of the two conditions for treatment. Another restores preventive dental care for the disabled. “The other one we heard about was the suicide hotline,” Jaquet said, which has received $160,000 in state funding in several other budgets that already have been approved, to match private funds and restart a state suicide prevention hotline. “So we as a committee have at least partially addressed those issues.”

Rep. Shirley Ringo, D-Moscow, said she’s still troubled by the continuing cut in preventive dental care for other patients on Medicaid. “I think we all recognize the value of preventive care,” she said. However, she joined in the unanimous vote. A group of JFAC members led by Rep. Fred Wood, R-Burley, a physician, crafted the Medicaid budget.