House Democrats back push for cost tally on Health Connector
House Democrats have overwhelmingly approved a Republican measure to force the Patrick administration to provide a total accounting of all taxpayer money used to salvage the broken Obamacare website and fund temporary health insurance coverage to Bay Staters.
“You can’t help but admit it’s a failure,” said House Minority Leader Bradley H. Jones Jr. (R-North Reading). “It’s an abject failure that’s going to cost the taxpayers, whether it’s the commonwealth of Massachusetts or money from the feds or rate-payers, tens of millions of dollars that shoudn’t have happened.”
A majority of House Democrats adopted Jones’ amendment to its budget late Wednesday night to force the Executive Office of Health and Human Services to review the financial impact of the failed Massachusetts Health Connector website and provide a cost analysis of state funds used for temporary insurance coverage. The bill is heading to the Senate for approval and would then need to be signed by Gov. Deval Patrick.
The rare bipartisan moment came on the same day that Connector officials, including Web czar Sarah Iselin and Executive Director Jean Yang, met with Obama administration officials in Washington, D.C., to discuss the option of a federal takeover of the mangled website. The Health Connector board is slated to meet May 8 to consider a full or partial takeover by either the federal or another state system.
Connector spokesman Jason Lefferts called the meeting “a good and productive discussion.”
“We anticipate the requested information will be provided sooner than July by the administration in response to requests from the Legislature,” he said of Jones’ amendment.
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