Kasich wants to continue Medicaid expansion

By Marc Kovac | April 10, 2015 at 12:02a.m.

COLUMBUS

Gov. John Kasich voiced confidence Thursday that Republican lawmakers would pass the spending authority he needs to continue expanded medical coverage for needy residents without having to go to the state Controlling Board, as he did two years ago.

Kasich included the Medicaid appropriations in his biennial budget proposal, and the governor told reporters he hoped lawmakers would sign off on the spending as requested.

Kasich accomplished the Medicaid expansion last session via a vote of the controlling board, thus bypassing a vote of the full Legislature after Republican lawmakers balked at the move.

Republicans in the Ohio House are expected next week to unveil an amended biennial budget, likely changing tax reform and other measures included by Kasich that they don’t support.

Though Medicaid eligibility already has been widened, the governor needs lawmakers to provide spending authority to cover the costs of the program over the next two fiscal years.

Rep. Ron Amstutz, R-Wooster, the House’s speaker pro tem, said Thursday he didn’t know how the chamber would end up addressing the issue.

“I think we’re trying to create a budget proposal that builds on what the executive proposed, and that will help accelerate our state by providing as efficient and effective services as we can,” he said. “That’s primarily education and health care. How we get that done? There’s a lot of different ways to get to an end goal. I don’t have any predictions exactly how that process is going to roll out.”

Kasich was more confident, however.

“I’m very hopeful that this program will be continued,” he said. “We’re trying to add some other personal-responsibility items that we would have liked to have had the first time, but we didn’t have the opportunity to do that because of the way the process worked.”

He added, “There’s a recognition that these dollars have made a difference. ... I couldn’t conceive of a half-a-million people all of sudden waking up one day and having no health care coverage as provided under this program.”