Senate Conference Committee Letter

January 16, 2006

Dear Colleague,

I am writing to follow up on the movement of healthcare reform through the legislature. As you can see below, the House and the Senate, while back at the table, have considerable differences to work out and have missed the January 15th deadline recommended by federal officials who asked for a plan to broadly expand access to health insurance, or risk losing hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funds. After Senate and House leaders traded criticisms over competing proposals last week, Senate President Robert Travaglini's, spending targets and revenue projections indicated that new revenue sources may be considered, "There is an effort to identify, in clearer terms, the revenues necessary for covering the uninsured, and making sure that our plan thrives in good times and survives the bad."

Travaglini said that said he would not favor increasing taxes to pay for health care expansion, specifically an increase in the cigarette tax, which has been proposed by some consumer groups as a new revenue source. Last week, House leaders estimated that within three years, the Senate plan would cost $2 billion and the House proposal would require $1.5 billion in revenues.

House Speaker Salvatore DiMasi later said that he was unsure if there were proposals being floated to identify a new revenue source. If there were, he said, he would be open to considering such a plan. "I clearly want to resolve the issue here and make sure we have a financially sustainable bill in place," DiMasi said, "Any proposals or alternatives that are going to be presented to us, we'll analyze them and negotiate." DiMasi, last week, described Senate plans to pay for insurance expansion with the state's rainy day or stabilization funds as a "non-starter." This week, DiMasi again criticized the Senate plan as unsustainable because it relies on one-time revenues from reserve accounts. "We believe our bill is financially sustainable the way it is," he said. "If (Travaglini) has a different proposal, we're always willing to listen to alternative proposals. I'm willing to listen."

Travaglini said conference committee discussions reached a "pitch yesterday that hasn't been seen since we started the dialogue," but disagreement remains between the branches over whether the expansion should be phased-in. "That's the big philosophical difference right here, whether we do this all at once, or if we do this incrementally," he said. "If you do everything all at once, it's going to put tremendous pressure on the health care system. And philosophically I have yet to be convinced that is the prudent way to proceed." "I think by focusing on the half a million people that we're trying to cover, we're putting at risk the 6 million people that already have coverage," Travaglini said. "We're putting the system at risk and our economy at risk. And I believe the Speaker and I will find the appropriate way to balance his desire to cover everybody immediately and my concern for the viability of the economy."

Legislative leaders have also agreed to seek the opinion of an outside financial expert, Travaglini said. Sen. Richard Moore (D-Uxbridge), said this week that he hopes to have an agreement by mid-February.

Back to Headlines

Healthcare Financial, Inc. is a one of the top resources for information on healthcare changes in Massachusetts.

Stay informed - Please sign up to receive our Industry Update emails.