Thursday morning, July 6th, the Ohio House of Representatives issued 11 veto overrides, and we are pleased to announce the freeze of Medicaid expansion enrollment was NOT one of them.
To recap, the Ohio General Assembly included in the final version of the state biennial budget (HB 49) a provision to freeze enrollment in Group VIII, commonly known as the Medicaid expansion population, as of July 1, 2018. According to the Office of Health Transformation, in addition to freezing new enrollment come July 1, this provision would strip 500K currently enrolled Ohioans of their coverage within 18 months of implementation. This loss of coverage is a result of Ohioans currently enrolled in Medicaid who cycle off and on for a multitude of reasons, including seasonal work, working more hours temporarily or earning additional wages for a period of time, paperwork, process issues etc.On June 30th, Governor Kasich vetoed this provision, striking it from HB 49. House and Senate leadership publicly discussed bringing their chambers back to override this veto. Because a vote to override a Governor’s veto must begin in the chamber of which the legislation was originated – in this case, it was the House – all eyes were on the Ohio House of Representatives this morning as the chamber gathered to override 11 vetoes. To put this in context a bit, there have only been 3 veto overrides in the last 27 years, and none up to this point on any of Governor Kasich’s vetoes.
Hands down, without a doubt, because of your advocacy and tremendous grassroots efforts – emails, phone calls, strong social media presence, Statehouse meetings, district meetings, town halls, and the Statehouse Rally, OACHC is pleased to announce the Medicaid enrollment freeze WAS NOT BROUGHT UP FOR AN OVERRRIDE VOTE, and as such, this provision stays out of the bill and will not become law…at least for now!
The House concluded their voting session, stating all remaining vetoes – including the freeze - are left pending. This means anytime between now and the end of this General Assembly (December 31, 2018) the House could bring this issue back up. We live to fight another day!
We may not be completely out of the woods, but for today we should celebrate this success! Community Health Center advocates absolutely deserve a HUGE pat on the back for their strong and ever present leadership, as do our legislators who stood up and raised their voices with their colleagues to at a minimum, delay this vote, if not, lay it to rest completely.
Great job Community Health Center advocates! Please join us in thanking legislators who supported our efforts by retweeting and sharing our social media posts on Facebook and Twitter .
