State legislators are moving quickly on a plan for privatizing Medicaid, with a final vote on the plan expected as early as Tuesday. More citizen input is needed before that happens.
Privatizing the state’s $14-billion Medicaid program is a huge and controversial deal that would impact many state residents.
“The proposal — more than two years in the making — represents a compromise between the House’s preference for not-for-profit health care systems and providers taking a lead role, and the Senate’s desire for a major private-sector influence,” the Journal’s Richard Craver reported Friday.
That same day, mental-health-care advocate Mary Annecelli of Winston-Salem sent an email to a large group that included legislators and the media. Before HB 372 becomes law, she wrote, legislators should have town-hall meetings at faith-based community institutions.
If not that, the legislature should at least hold another hearing on that matter, allowing plenty of time for those who will be impacted by it to speak. We realize that Rep. Donny Lambeth of Forsyth County, a former health-care executive whom we respect, and other state leaders have been working long and hard on this plan. But there can be no harm in receiving more citizen input. In fact, there could be great good in that.
