The state Senate has voted to lift an enrollment cap on the state’s popular Family Care program for the elderly and disabled. The bill’s future in the Assembly remains unclear, as Green Bay Democrat Dave Hansen notes that chamber has already failed to advance legislation passed by the Senate. “I would hope that is not the case with Family Care,” says Hansen. “We’ve got to able to move together, and the Assembly’s got to respect what we pass here.”
AUDIO: Senator Jon Erpenbach (2:25)
The program administered by the state Department of Health Services keeps some 40,000 enrollees out of nursing homes. Several thousand more are on waiting lists. Governor Scott Walker commended the Senate’s action – although he’d initially imposed the cap as a cost saving measure. The federal government ordered him to lift it. “I would hope that Governor Walker would take some time out of his busy schedule to work with the Assembly Republicans, to make sure this does come up for a vote,” says Middleton Democrat Jon Erpenbach. “I’m concerned that he’ll actually do that, just given his record on health care overall.”
Chippewa Falls Republican Terry Moulton voices concerns about Democrat statements. “I thought that we were not supposed to question motives of authors of legislation in this body,” he says. “I certainly hope that’s not the case.”
In addition to lifting the enrollment cap, the bill (SB 380) also allows DHS to expand the program’s reach, although Eagle River Democrat Jim Holperin questions when and if that will happen. “Counties that don’t have the program are kind of on their own for an undetermined amount of time until the state regains its fiscal footing, and then there might be expansion at that time, or their might not be,” says Holperin. “Nobody knows.”