GOP takes issue with $230,000 request to study single-payer options

by Alicia Freese vtdigger.org Republicans are protesting one of the smaller in the items in the Shumlin administration’s request for additional money in Fiscal Year 2014.
Robin Lunge, director of health care reform, is asking for $230,000 to help lay the groundwork for the state’s publicly financed health care system, scheduled to be in place by 2017.
The total of all budget adjustment requests is $12.5 million.
House Republican leader Rep. Don Turner, R-Milton, issued a statement Wednesday saying that he and his fellow Republicans were ‘shocked’ by the request. Republicans have opposed the switch to single payer.
There are several components to Lunge’s request. The $127,000 salary (including benefits) for Michael Costa, the designated point person for figuring out how to finance that system, is the biggest, but it isn’t a surprise. Costa left his post in the Tax Department in June to move to his new position in the Agency of Administration.
Lunge has also asked for $100,000 to pay the University of Massachusetts to provide more detailed analyses of the financing options for publicly financed health care. UMass supplied the administration’s finance plan, which was unveiled in January, as required by statute.
At the time, Republican lawmakers accused the administration of violating that statute by failing to point to a specific funding mechanism.
The point of the UMass contract, according to Lunge, is to offer lawmakers more details about financing options. ‘We expect Legislature will want to refamiliarize themselves with what was passed in Act 48 and also may want to dig into the financing estimates in the UMass reports.’
But those clamoring for answers last session say the administration shouldn’t need more money to comply with their request.
‘We continue to believe that Vermonters deserve answers on how much Shumlincare is going to cost and who is going to pay,’ Turner said in the statement. ‘That being said, with the shortfall we are facing in meeting our budget needs for 2015’s budget we simple (sic) can’t afford to pay for the Governor’s additional studies and staff in the budget adjustment.’
The final piece of Lunge’s request is $50,000 to hire a consultant to ‘move forward with high level operational planning.’