Wednesday, September 4, 2013

Legislative Update Week of August 26th.

With the leaves starting to turn, children starting to collect their supplies for the upcoming school year and the sounds of football filling the weekends, it must mean that fall is around the corner. With that also means that the legislature is back in session ready to deal with the pending question that everyone has been working on and waiting for an answer to, Medicaid Expansion HB 4714. The Senate met this past week on Tuesday to finally answer that question, but lets review how we ended up here.

June:

The House has passed their version of the Medicaid Expansion leaving it to the Senate to work on the issue before the legislative summer break. The Senate discharges the bill from committee consideration the last week of session starting the debates internally in the Senate Republican caucus on how they were for or against the expansion. During this time the Governor is away on an economic mission in Israel and the Lieutenant Governor was in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan leaving the executives out of Lansing and leaving Medicaid floundering.

Wednesday of the final week the Lieutenant Governor cuts his trip short to head back to Lansing to work with the Senators to somehow help push Medicaid over the finish line in the Senate. At the same time two other Senators say they are working on or have alternative proposals for the Senate to consider. After Wednesday no progress had been made in moving the vote forward leaving Thursday the final day before the legislature headed out for summer and leaving the Governor on a plane back from Israel to Michigan to try to push the expansion over the finish line.

The Governor made his appearance just before noon on Thursday and starting meeting with individual senators one on one, trying to get their issues solved so that the Senate could vote on Medicaid that day. Hours dragged on leaving by 5:00 pm that day still votes short in the Senate and a frustrated Governor having a press conference saying that the Senate should stay rather than go home and solve the expansion issue. The Senate had another plan and sent the Medicaid expansion bill to the Senate Government Operations committee where a work group would be created to work on the bill over the summer. The Senate broke for the summer leaving Medicaid still hanging in the wings.

July and August:

Senator Richardville convened the Government Operations committee announcing that there would be a work group that would be drafting legislation that would be suitable to all parties in the Senate and that they would meet on a weekly basis. Senator Kahn, MD was the lead of the work group, using his experience as a physician to provide clarity, insight, and leadership to the work group. The Government Operations committee would meet every two weeks looking for an update on the progress of the work group and report to those who attended the committee meetings.

The workgroup finally came to the committee with a product at the end of July where then the committee took testimony from the interested groups on their opinions and either support or nonsupport for the legislation. The committee also considered two other Medicaid plans that were provided by Senators Collbeck and Caswell. SB 422 and SB 459 and SB 460 were the alternative plans provided to the committee. Many of the groups testifying supported HB 4714 but did not provide their support for the other pieces of legislation. At the end of the committee meeting all three plans made it out where a showdown was expected on the Senate floor.

August 27th:

The Senate came in for their final summer session day with high stakes looming over the Senate. This was the day that the Medicaid vote was going to happen, leaving the hallway to the Senate chambers full of advocates for or against Medicaid expansion ready to push votes the way they wanted to. The Lieutenant Governor was ready to break any tie votes that had come on the floor; the stage was set. The Senate took up HB 4714 where the vote on it the firs time left them one vote short 19-18 with Senator Collbeck abstaining from voting. Since this wasn't a majority of the Senate voting for the bill failed.

A reconsideration motion was made quickly after and the leadership of the Senate along with the Governor's office continued to work on the members that were still in opposition of the legislation. Finally after some amendments the vote was taken again and this time Senator Casperson, a Republican from Escanaba, switched his vote and voted for the expansion allowing the legislation to pass 20-18. The legislation still waits in the Senate thought since the chamber fell two votes short on granting the legislation immediate effect. The Senate will be considering this on Tuesday September 2nd when they come back to start their fall schedule.

Stay with MSMS to get all of the up to date information surround Medicaid other issue at http://www.msms.org/advocacy.