Raimondo pulls Medicaid co-pays proposal from Rhode Island state budget

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — A high-profile cost-savings idea in Gov. Gina Raimondo’s budget plan — charging co-pays to Medicaid recipients — appears dead.

On the same day Medicaid beneficiaries gathered at the State House in support of the program, Raimondo’s communications director, Mike Raia, told The Providence Journal Tuesday that her “administration will request that funding be restored to avoid charging Medicaid customers a co-pay.”

As it turns out, the the initiative’s prospects were bleak anyway.

Shortly after Raimondo moved to pull the co-pays from the budget, House Speaker Nicholas Mattiello said in an email that he had already been looking to kill it in the upcoming House version of the annual state tax and spending plan.

“My colleagues and I were particularly troubled by the Governor’s proposal to impose co-pays on certain Medicaid recipients, which would have had a negative impact on their constituents and providers alike,” Mattiello wrote in an email. “House Finance Committee members raised numerous concerns about this issue at the budget hearing, and the House was not inclined to include it in the final budget.”

Read more: http://www.providencejournal.com/news/20180522/raimondo-pulls-medicaid-co-pays-proposal-from-ri-state-budget