ACS Views on Legislative, Regulatory, and Other Issues

Health Partnership Act—

Staff Contact: Adrienne Roberts, aroberts@facs.org

• Health Partnership Act Fact Sheet
• Letter to The Honorable Tammy Baldwin 1/23/07 (500K PDF)
• Letter to The Honorable Jeff Bingaman 1/23/07 (500K PDF)
• Letter to The Honorable Tom Price, MD, FACS, 1/23/07 (500K PDF)
• Letter to The Honorable John Tierney 1/23/07 (500K PDF)
• Letter to The Honorable George Voinovich 1/23/07 (500K PDF)

THE HEALTH PARTNERSHIP ACT

and

THE HEALTH PARTNERSHIP THROUGH CREATIVE FEDERALISM ACT

A BICAMERAL, BIPARTISAN, FEDERAL-STATE PARTNERSHIP APPROACH TO BREAKING THE POLITICAL LOGJAM ON COVERING THE UNINSURED

Senator Jeff Bingaman (D-NM)
Senator George Voinovich (R-OH)
Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI)
Rep. Tom Price, MD, FACS (R-GA)
Rep. John Tierney (D-MA)

Summary:  The conventional wisdom is that it is impossible to make any significant progress to help the uninsured in a polarized Congress.  Meanwhile, the Census Bureau reports that the number of uninsured Americans has grown to over 45 million Americans. 

The Health Partnership Act provides a path to move forward.  These bills would:

• Break the Congressional logjam by allowing a diverse array of ideas to be tried in specific states.
• Test strategies that span the political spectrum to see which are most effective, while protecting Americans already enrolled in programs.
• Expand health care coverage to Americans in need of health care.

Details:  Congress would authorize grants to individual states, groups of states, or portions of states to carry out any of a broad range of strategies to increase health care coverage.  States desiring to participate in a health care expansion and improvement program would submit an application to a bipartisan “State Health Innovation Commission.” 

The Commission would consider applications that include a variety of approaches, such as tax credits, expansion of Medicaid or SCHIP, creation of pooling arrangements like the FEHBP, single payer systems, health savings accounts, or a combination of these or other options.

After reviewing the state proposals, the Commission would submit to Congress a slate of recommended state applications that represents a variety of approaches. 

States receiving grants would be required to report on their progress.  At the end of a five-year period, the Commission would be required to report to Congress whether the states are meeting the goals of the Act and recommend future action Congress should take regarding overall reform. 

For additional information contact: Jude McCartin (Bingaman) 202-224-5521; Garrette Silverman (Voinovich) 202-224-3353; Jerilyn Goodman (Baldwin) 608-347-6557; Jim Billimoria (Price) 202-225-4501; Catherine Ribeiro (Tierney) 202-225-8020

Online January 31, 2007

ACS Views on Legislative, Regulatory, and Other Issues

Advocacy and Health Policy