Private Option Sponsor: Conservatives Should Unite

ROGERS — Fighting old battles about the private option in health care will only benefit two Arkansas Democrats who helped create the dilemma in the first place, Rep. John Burris, R-Harrison, told conservatives Saturday.

“We wouldn’t have this problem if Mike Ross and Mark Pryor had represented their constituents,” Burris told Conservative Arkansas. The grassroots group met Saturday morning at the Rogers Public Library. Ross was a U.S. House member when federal health care reform passed who is now running for governor. Sen. Pryor, D-Ark., is running for re-election.

“Ross has the audacity to run for governor and believe everybody is too dumb to remember that,” Burris said.

Tyler Clark, chairman of the Washington County Democrats, replied: “If Rep. Burris is so out of touch that he doesn’t believe Arkansans wanted affordable health care, maybe he’s the one who should go home.”

The Republican majority in the Legislature made the best of a bad situation, Burris said. He said the decision to accept federal taxpayer dollars and use it to help pay for private insurance was controversial, even though it was different in principle than taking the money to expand Medicaid, as the federal health care reform law intended. Burris is chairman of the House Public Health Committee and a major contributing author to the private option plan.

The private option plan reduces state dependence on Medicaid instead of expanding it, Burris said. More importantly, he said, it structures Medicaid in such a way it will be easier to fix the program when the federal government’s bad budget decisions come home to roost.

Burris compared the federal Medicaid program to a light switch, which is either on or off. “People are either on it or off it,” he said. “Every time you tried to cut it, you were asked ‘Who are you going to kick out of a nursing home?’ It was impossible to cut.”

Private option, which will extend health care coverage to about 250,000 Arkansans, is like a dimmer switch. You can turn it down without putting out the lights, Burris said. When the federal government’s fiscal mistakes catch up with them and “Congress gets serious about entitlement cuts, you can scale back the program without cutting anyone off,” Burris said. The core people in the program such as the elderly are safe from cuts, he said.

The program is “reformable in ways Medicaid is not,” Burris said.

Yvonne Couch of Bentonville worked for the state Department of Human Services from 1975 to 2008 in Medicaid administration. A member of the group, she spoke during the “light dimmer” portion of Burris remarks. “This sounds good to me,” she said. “This sounds like it could work.”

Rep. Jim Dotson, R-Bentonville, voted against private option and attended Saturday’s meeting. He said he remains unconvinced but “it’s the law of the state now.” Asked if the issue would continue to divide conservatives, Dotson said only time will tell. “If the election were held today? For certain,” he said. “But primaries are a year from now and the general election is a year and a half. By that time, we’ll know if the federal government will grant the waivers we need for this to work.”

Benton County Judge Bob Clinard was among the crowd of about 40. He told Burris he wasn't happy with the direction the country was going, “but you did the right thing on the private option. We’re going to move on.”

Ralph Hudson of Springdale, an officer of the group and longtime member, said even conservatives who support the private option have trouble defending the decision to go ahead and take the vote so quickly after the plan was designed. They don’t have an effective response to opponents who ask why Republicans didn't insist on a special session, and many supporters would have preferred that also. Burris replied Democratic determination to force the issue gave major leverage to conservatives. “We could say, ‘Here’s 10 things we want. Give us all of them, or no deal,’” Burris said. “If we’d held off for a special session, negotiations might have left us with eight or nine.”

The pressure is now on Democrats to deliver, Burris said. If President Obama’s administration doesn’t like the “Arkansas option” and rejects it, “that’s 250,000 poor, working Arkansans who are not covered because of them,” he said.

“I would love spending the next two years blaming Barack Obama for not letting Arkansas craft its plan,” Burris said.

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