Larranaga: Health plan is DOA
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Larranaga also talked about water, education, drug prevention and other issues, and previewed the coming session.
As a member of the House Appropriations and Finance Committee,
Larranaga has a key role to play in the coming 30-day session. By law,
the Legislature is limited to three areas in even-numbered years:
budget/finance, legislation previously introduced and items submitted
by the governor.
That’s one reason why Richardson’s proposal for universal health care
is expected to be the major battle of the session, especially in an
election year where both the House and Senate are up for election and
the governor is running for president.
Larranaga noted that a task force set up to study health care voted against recommending the governor’s plan.
“That’s almost immediately the first test whether something is going to
at least get an opportunity to make it through or not,” he said.
Larranaga, who was first elected to the House in 1995 after serving two
governors as director of the forerunner to today’s State Transportation
Department, said he expected very little change in health care law this
year.
“That’s not to say a commission may not be set up – but even that is in
limbo at this point,” he said. “The only thing that might (pass) is a
structure of a commission, saying let’s have somebody look and this and
determine what we should be looking for to do a revision,
“That’s about as far as I would go. It (the governor’s plan) is just too much.”
Larranaga said proponents of the governor’s plan failed to involve key
elements of the medical community in drafting the legislation.
“They didn’t get all the players that are involved from they medical
field. They didn’t get it there. They didn’t get it in the task force.
They didn’t get it in the committee meetings. They didn’t get it
anywhere,” he said. “That’s a good sign that it isn’t going to go.”
Larranaga said he was looking forward to Monday’s meeting in Santa Fe,
where the entire Legislature has been invited to hear a presentation
from the private company that helped craft Richardson’s bill.
“We’ll see what they have on Monday. We’ve all seen parts of this.
We’ll see what kind of variables the have, how they put things
together. That’s the big part,” he said. “They say, ‘Well, we think we
can save money, be we have to charge it to the business people out
there. It’s not going to be something unless people start believing
this is the answer.
“The devil is in the details. It truly is. It all comes down to bucks.
Financially if it’s not sound, if it’s not something we think they can
sell, it won’t make it.”
