Christine Jordan Sexton
It didn’t take long for House Appropriation Chairman Richard Corcoran‘s speech to be heard down the halls in the Florida Senate.
As the chamber finished its work on Wednesday and recess for the Easter holiday Senate President Andy Gardiner told senators that the chamber wasn’t going to “rant and rave” but would focus its efforts instead on finding a way to plug a potential $2.2 billion shortfall in the budget if the Low Income Pool were to be eliminated and and provide access to 800,000 uninsured residents. Low Income Pool is a supplemental pot of Medicaid dollars the state uses to fund hopsitals, federally qualified health centers, graduate medical education and HMOs.
And while Corcoran invited the Senate to “go to war” with the special health care interests, such as the hospitals, Gardiner said the Senate was prepared to have a discussion on how to bridge the gaping differences between the spending plans. The House has passed a $76.2 billion budget and the Senate has passed an $80.4 billion plan.
The $4 billion-plus difference is due mostly to the fact the Senate has included Medicaid expansion and LIP in its spending plan and the House has included neither.
“Poking holes in ideas, or poking holes in somebody’s bill and saying well, ‘that won’t work, that won’t work,’ …. well, put something forward and let’s talk about it,” Gardner said.
Speculation that the differences between the spending plans was too large to be bridged had Tallahassee lobbyists whispering about a potential special session to settle the 2015-16 budget
Those talks went from quiet speculation to loud conjecture Thursday after Agency for Health Care Administration Secretary Liz Dudek issued a brief statement late Wednesday night saying that the federal government’s chief LIP negotiator, Eliot Fishman, would not be available for the next two weeks.
“For (the federal government) to discontinue LIP negotiations now is troubling and could signal the abrupt end of this federal healthcare program in Florida,” Dudek’s statement read.
But the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services shot back on Thursday issuing a statement saying it had not not discontinued the conversations. “Senior officials from CMS will continue conversations with state officials about our shared goal of securing access to high quality health care coverage for low income Floridians.”
CMS did reiterate in its statement, though, that it did not plan on extending LIP in its current form beyond June 30.
Gardiner said that the Senate was prepared for the June 30 expiration of LIP and that it had been working on an alternative Low Income Pool for months.
Meanwhile, Senate Budget Chief Tom Lee told members that a four-day scheduled break in session would give them time to “get grounded” and that they should come back “refreshed and ready to get to work.”
Lee said that the Senate decided “early on” to ensure that health care was a top priority in the budget.
“Everyone has priorities, and that’s ours,” Lee said.
