Issue Position: Medicaid Reform
Issue Position
Medicaid is one of the largest items in the New York State Budget and it is the largest expenditure in county budgets. In order for New York State to continue on the road to fiscal stability and for counties to stay within the 2% property tax cap without compromising essential services such as public safety, more needs to be done to make the Medicaid program more cost effective.
Governor Andrew Cuomo established the Medicaid Redesign Team (MRT) that was tasked with recommending changes to the Medicaid program that would make it more financially viable without reducing essential medical services to those in need. The MRT recommended generic drugs be utilized when applicable for Medicaid clients, something that many others and I have advocated. This change was approved and has resulted in a significant savings to the State and $2 million a year for Niagara County.
If elected, I plan on working with Governor Cuomo to continue his efforts to redesign Medicaid. An area that I am focused on would not deny or alter coverage but would only impact the insurance companies and save the State and counties millions of dollars. All of us who have health insurance either have single or family coverage depending upon our personal situation. However, under the Medicaid Managed Care program, a family of four has four single coverage plans.
Healthy New York is a health insurance program that is provided to uninsured working people who meet certain eligibility requirements. If a family is enrolled in Healthy New York, the monthly premium is $850 a month. A family of four on Medicaid Managed Care would have four single plans which costs taxpayers $1,200 a month, a difference of $350.
Currently there are two thousand households in Niagara County with four or more people on Medicaid. If these households had one family plan as opposed to four or more single plans, the State Medicaid Program would save $901,666 per month resulting in a savings to Niagara County of $2.7 million. Can you imagine how much of a savings that would be statewide!!
It's these types of changes that can be made which would bring the cost of Medicaid down without impacting services for those in need. With your help, I will bring this forward in Albany come January 2013.
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