by Assistant Majority Leader Tarryl Clark

In a Survey USA poll conducted last week for KSTP-TV, 84 percent of Minnesotans said that funds collected from health care taxes and Minnesota health insurance premiums should not be used for purposes other than health care.  Given the obvious logic of that statement, the results are hardly surprising.  Yet, Gov. Pawlenty is still clinging to the idea that the health care tax and premium fund should be raided to fill holes in other parts of the budget.

Originally, the governor proposed taking out a quarter billion dollars from the fund to help balance the state’s budget.  This week, he proposed reducing that to $125 million, to be offset by another $125 million in cuts to health care coverage from other parts of the state budget.  While it’s good that he’s willing to make movement on the health care fund, he contradicts its purpose by reducing health care coverage.  It would be a far better idea to find savings from cutting administrative costs and overhead in the health care system instead.

At a time when more and more people are faced with reduction or complete loss of health care coverage, health care funds should be used to help pay doctors and hospitals for the care they provide to the uninsured and underinsured.  We need to cut costs, and the first and best place is to start with those parts of the health care system that are the least essential to the actual provision of diagnosis, treatment and care.  Just cutting off patients from coverage doesn’t eliminate the need or the cost; it just shifts the expense onto the private health care system through higher insurance rates and bad debt for our clinics and hospitals.

Health care taxes have been set at 2 percent since Gov. Pawlenty and Republican legislators allowed a 25 percent increase in 2003 as a budget-balancing move.  The funds are deposited in the Health Care Access Fund, which also collects money from premiums paid by MinnesotaCare policyholders.

When the governor proposes shifting funds from this account, he is also proposing shifting a portion of these premium dollars paid by working Minnesotans.

MinnesotaCare is not a welfare program.  It’s a health insurance plan for working Minnesotans who cannot afford coverage on the private market.  Every policyholder pays a premium based on their ability to pay, some over $300 per month.  Diverting any of these funds for non-health care related expenses simply isn’t right.

When the health care fund was created in 1992, it was the promise of Republican and DFL legislators, along with the Republican governor, that the money in this account would be used exclusively to provide medical insurance coverage for working families.

That promise lasted until 2003, when Gov. Pawlenty helped create a surplus in the fund by allowing the tax to go up 25 percent, while canceling coverage for tens of thousands of policyholders.  He then shifted money from the account to cover budget holes in other areas of the state budget. 

This was an outrageous breach of faith, and needs to be set right.  Both the House and the Senate have passed ways to balance the state’s budget without raiding the health care fund.  The budget compromise ought to keep the promise made to taxpayers and policyholders and keep the Health Care Access Fund intact.