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Business group sues Blagojevich over health-care expansion

Posted December 04, 2007 10:00 pm

Doug Finke

A coalition of business groups filed suit in Sangamon County Tuesday to stop Gov. Rod Blagojevich's expansion of health-care programs.

The Illinois Coalition of Jobs, Growth and Prosperity contends that Blagojevich's decision to expand state-funded health-care coverage without the General Assembly's approval is unconstitutional. It also says lawmakers never approved money for the expansion, leaving open the prospect that enrollees will not be able to get health care because doctors and hospitals have no guarantee they will be paid for their services.

The lawsuit asks the court to halt the expansion and to prohibit Comptroller Dan Hynes from paying any bills connected with it.

"To unilaterally expand health care at a cost of $365 million at a time that state finances are stretched thin and the General Assembly hasn't approved it, even for him, that's a little cheeky," said Greg Baise, president of the Illinois Manufacturers' Association, a member of the coalition.

The Blagojevich administration issued a written statement blasting the lawsuit as the work of "Republican activists."

"It's unfortunate that two prominent Republican activists would go to court to take health care away from families," Blagojevich spokeswoman Rebecca Rausch said in the statement. "President Bush wouldn't even go to those lengths. Every Democratic leader in Illinois should join us in fighting this lawsuit and help protect the hardworking people who rely on us for health coverage so they can keep seeing a doctor."

"This is not about health care. This is about observing and obeying the laws of the state," said coalition chairman Ron Gidwitz, a former GOP candidate for governor. "This quite clearly is an effort to stop the administration from violating, once again, the state Constitution. If we are not a country and state of laws, this will be a state governed by chaos."

As part of his budget speech last spring, Blagojevich asked lawmakers to approve a program granting universal access to health care in the state. He sought a gross receipts tax on Illinois businesses to pay for it.

Lawmakers overwhelmingly rejected the GRT, and the health-care expansion never passed either the House or the Senate.

In August, Blagojevich said he would expand health-care coverage anyway, and his Department of Healthcare and Family Services last month filed an emergency administrative rule expanding eligibility for the FamilyCare health program. The rule said Illinoisans who make as much as 400 percent of the federal poverty level could obtain coverage, meaning a family of four making $82,600 a year is eligible.

The administration said the change would open up the program to an additional 147,000 people. Some lawmakers predicted the annual cost of the expansion would hit $367 million.

A bipartisan panel of lawmakers known as the Joint Committee on Administrative Rules blocked the rule from taking effect. However, the department ignored JCAR and began enrolling people in the program Dec. 1. An administration spokeswoman said the JCAR ruling was advisory only and that the panel did not have the authority to stop the expansion.

The lawsuit filed Tuesday maintains that JCAR does have the authority to stop the expansion, an authority given to it through a bill signed by Blagojevich. It also argues that the governor and DHFS do not have the authority to expand programs on their own and obligate the state for millions of dollars in expenses that were not approved by the General Assembly.

"If allowed to continue enforcement and implementation of this now-suspended rule, (DHFS) will force the state to incur hundreds of millions of dollars in debt for which no money has been appropriated by the Illinois General Assembly," the lawsuit states. "New enrollees under this expanded program and health care providers will be left without any certainty as to the source of payment for these medical services."

"The wanton encouragement of expenses without any checks and balances from the General Assembly will force taxpayers to pay whatever the governor deems appropriate," Gidwitz said.

The Illinois Coalition of Jobs, Growth and Prosperity represents thousands of businesses. Other members include the Illinois Chamber of Commerce, the Illinois Retail Merchants Association, the Chicago Chamber of Commerce and the Business Roundtable.

Doug Finke can be reached at (217) 788-1527 or doug.finke@sj-r.com.

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