The Florida House is moving ahead with a health care proposal that rejects billions of dollars in federal cash intended to extend health coverage to a million uninsured Floridians.
On Friday the House Appropriations Committee passed a scaled-back health care plan that uses only state money to provide health insurance to low-income, disabled adults and those with children.
The proposal would give them $2,000 annual subsidies to buy private health insurance through a new program called Florida Health Choices.
Florida House Speaker Will Weatherford, R-Wesley Chapel, estimates the plan would help about 400,000 Floridians get into private health care plans.
He argues Florida cant count on the federal government to send more than $50 billion to the state over the next decade for expanded health insurance.
The challenge with the federal government is, we just cant trust them to fulfill their promises," the speaker said. "This is a federal government that hasnt passed a budget in four years. Its a federal government that has a $16 trillion deficit and weve just decided as the Florida House that our plan should be sustainable, we can pay for it with state funds and we can also utilize the federal exchange that will start in January of 2014.
Meanwhile, the Florida Senate has a proposal that would accept the federal money to expand health coverage to about a million uninsured Floridians.
Some lawmakers have pushed for a mix of the two proposals. Weatherford says hes willing to negotiate on expanding the number of people covered in the House plan, but hes not ready to talk about accepting the federal cash.
Dave Heller is a Tallahassee freelance reporter/videographer.
