MISSISSIPPI HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
WEEKLY SUMMARY REPORT FOR WEEK ENDING MARCH 08, 2002

JACKSON, Miss. – The Legislature and the governor finally agreed this week on a bail-out plan for Mississippi’s massively expensive Medicaid program. A version of the much-amended HB 1200 finally was passed by the House and Senate and signed into law by Governor Musgrove. The action came during the ninth week of the 2002 legislative session.

The plan does not include any fees or assessments of the sort that had enraged physicians and other providers when prior versions were under consideration, but does includes reductions to Medicaid providers and services and increases in prescription drug co-payments for recipients. The revised HB 1200 as signed into law is expected to cover most of a $158 million deficit incurred by the Governor's Division of Medicaid for the current FY 2002 which ends June 30, 2002. The program serves an estimated 650,000 Mississippians – almost one in every four.

Physicians and facilities serving Medicaid patients will see reimbursements reduced by 5 percent when they treat Medicaid recipients. University Medical Center and other state agencies whose services are covered under the federal matching funds umbrella will be exempt from those reductions. Also, pharmacists' dispensing fees were cut, recipients' co-payments on drugs will rise from $1 to $3 per prescription and prescriptions will be for a 34-day supply instead of 90 days. The number of prescriptions per month was reduced from 10 to seven, with any above the fifth requiring prior approval of the Governor's Medicaid Office. The plan includes some other cost-saving measures such as charging Medicare whenever possible instead of Medicaid.

The largest part of the funding for the new law is $108 million taken from the Health Care (Tobacco) Trust Fund. This money is supposed to start to be repaid once state revenues begin growing by more than 5 percent above previous fiscal years' revenues; however, many doubt the seriousness of the Legislature’s commitment to repay the money considering that amendments to make such repayment more certain were defeated. The law contains only a weak 5 percent growth trigger for repayment similar to the infamous 5 percent growth trigger first applied to the multi-year teacher pay raise plan enacted in 2000, only later to be ignored and discarded.

On Thursday, the House also passed SB 2189, which provides the technical law required to operate the Medicaid program. This bill was amended to require drug companies to pay a $2,500 fee for each of their marketing representatives working in the state. These funds are supposed to help pay for a Medicaid drug management program. The state could go after any company not paying the marketing fee. Opponents of the amendment termed the fee little more than extortion, pointing out that no other industry pays an exorbitant fee of this nature for the privilege of selling its products within the state, and that no other state imposes such a fee on drug reps.

In addition to Medicaid, a major focus of the ninth week of the session dealt with general bills and constitutional amendments that originated in the Senate. The House was under a March 5 deadline for committees to approve or reject Senate bills. Likewise, the Senate was under the same deadline to deal with bills that originated in the House of Representatives.

Once the committees finished their work, the bills that survived the committee process moved on to the full House and Senate for approval or rejection. The deadline for floor action is March 13. Many of the Senate bills voted on this week were seen previously in the form of House bills. Final versions of bills will be worked out in conference committees involving three representatives and three senators, then the full Legislature will take a final vote on them near the end of the session.

HERE ARE EXAMPLES of some of the actions taken this week in both House committees and the full House:

Other bills passing the House included: SB 2890 to allow State Tax Commission enforcement of wine and beer laws and to make it a crime to manufacture fake ID cards; SB 2735 to prohibit "canned" hunts of game animals in enclosed areas; SB 2781 to permit authorities to donate seized game meat to be donated for food for prisoners; SB 2146 to prohibit bingo operations near a church during church hours; and SB 2848 to lower the blood alcohol content for DUI violations to .08 percent to meet federal requirements. The blood alcohol bill survived several attempts to amend and perhaps kill it, and now will go to Governor Musgrove’s desk.

SOME BILLS DIED this week. A Senate committee killed HB 400 which would have created a board to oversee the Department of Human Services, while a House committee killed SB 2654 which would have made nursing home records available only to the patient. Also killed was HB 940 to allow the teaching of gaming-related courses at state universities and two-year colleges.
Other bills dying in committee were SB 2296 that would have allowed citizens to put their name on a do-not-call list to stop telemarketing calls; SB 2644 to require counseling for divorce-seeking parents of minor children; and SB 2456 to require that state prisoners would manufacture Mississippi car tags, which historically are done by out of state firms on a bid basis.

Work on the state budget is a constant theme of each legislative session -- both the current fiscal year's budget (FY 2002) and the next one (FY 2003). The Appropriations Committee this week voted to restore about $50 million in cuts to K-12 public education that had been made earlier in the year by Gov. Ronnie Musgrove. If approved by the full Legislature, the restoration of these funds will enable many districts to operate as originally planned during the current 2002 fiscal year. It remains to be seen, however, whether this can be accomplished, and both the House and Senate currently have different proposals to address the problem.

The Appropriations committee also approved additional funding for numerous special-fund agencies, those which generate most of their operations through fees or that receive most of it from the federal government. An example of a special fund agency is the one that operates Mississippi Veterans Memorial Stadium in Jackson through athletic, musical and other events.

Perhaps the best news of the week was the report on state revenues for February, which were above estimates for the first time in more than a year. National forecasts have been saying the recession has ended and the economy should show a slow revival. While the February revenue numbers are encouraging, many tough months remain ahead. Nevertheless, members hope this perhaps is a first indication of eventual better times ahead.