Virginia – House Passes Medicaid Expansion

April 2018 ~

The Virginia House of Delegates recently passed a state budget that includes funding for Medicaid expansion and stricter work requirements. If finalized, the state budget legislation would expand Medicaid eligibility to about 400,000 low-income adults.

The House approved the state budget for the fiscal year that ends on June 30 and the budget for the biennium that begins July 1. The current budget legislation is a “new version of its old budget” with a few changes aimed at stabilizing the market and reducing costs.

The amendments to Virginia’s budget legislation include toughened work requirement for able-bodied adult Medicaid recipients, as well as a request for a federal waiver that would allow Virginia to develop ways to stabilize the crippled individual market for commercial insurance and reduce premiums for middle-income families who do not currently receive subsidies under the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Amendments were also made that seek to ensure that all excess tax revenues collected in this fiscal year go into a new cash reserve.

The budget legislation also includes a proposed tax on hospital revenues that would be capped at 10% under the ACA and is estimated to raise about $307 million in the biennium to pay the state’s share of the costs of Medicaid expansion.

The measure is now on its way to the Senate for review and will then be resolved through a Conference Committee composed of members of the House Appropriations and the Senate Finance Committees.

Source(s): Daily Press; Washington Post; WTOP; Richmond Times Dispatch;