BOISE – Gov. Butch Otter has vetoed legislation that sought to block federal health reforms in Idaho but directed state agencies to take steps to avoid most of the White House provisions. The measure, House Bill 298, said that Idaho wouldn’t comply with discretionary provisions of the law for one year and prohibited the state from accepting federal money to implement the federal law or from moving to set up a health care exchange.

OLYMPIA – Federal health care reform may be among the most controversial issues in the nation. In many ways Washington state could be considered ground zero for that partisan debate. Republicans in Congress have vowed to repeal it, with Eastern Washington’s Republican Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers sponsoring an amendment to keep any money from being used to implement the 2009 law. The state’s Democratic senators, Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell, are big supporters of the law and say it can help ease the state’s growing Medicaid costs.