Lawmakers convened Wednesday for a gathering that House Speaker Shap Smith encouraged them not to view as a “doom and gloom session.”
The senators and representatives were briefed on a $72 million budget gap, the serious shortfall in the teacher retirement fund, possible cuts to federal funding, and the status of the state’s still-not-entirely-functional health exchange.
The Legislature doesn’t convene until Jan. 9, but Smith described the Wednesday meeting as a way to give lawmakers the “lay of the land” ahead of that date.
Shumlin’s agenda: Secretary of Administration Jeb Spaulding offered a bare bones sketch of Gov. Peter Shumlin’s priorities for the upcoming session. His top one is already a familiar refrain in the Statehouse halls: creating jobs and prosperity.
Beyond that, Spaulding said, Shumlin is focused on improving Vermont Health Connect, bolstering the Vermont Working Landscape initiative, “finishing the job” on early education and preschool, completing statewide broadband coverage, and balancing the budget.
Fiscal woes: Legislative economist Tom Kavet gave a rundown on the revenue coming into the state. “This is not all doom and gloom, but it could be a whole lot better,” he told lawmakers. Incoming revenues to the state’s three main funds — general, transportation and education — are very slightly above target, according to Kavet. He noted that while he hasn’t observed any “big revenue weakness,” neither does he expect any “big budget rescue coming in revenues.”
Absent an unexpected revenue “rescue,” the Shumlin administration and lawmakers will be left grappling with what Steve Klein, the chief fiscal officer for the Legislature, estimates will be a $72 million budget gap for fiscal year 2015.
But before they face that, the administration will ask the Legislature to approve a budget adjustment for fiscal year 2014, which Finance and Management Commissioner Jim Reardon currently pegs at $13.5 million. Reardon said he would deliver a definitive figure to the House Appropriations Committee on Dec. 2.
During the afternoon session, State Treasurer Beth Pearce briefed lawmakers on rising health care costs and the burden that’s placed on the teachers retirement system.
Vermont Health Connect: Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have been critical of the halting start to Vermont’s health insurance exchange, Vermont Health Connect.
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Department of Vermont Health Access Commissioner Mark Larson, addressing the Legislature as whole for the first time since its launch, began by saying, “It’s important for me to acknowledge the obvious.”
The “obvious,” as Larson describes it, is that the exchange has not lived up to expectations.
Some lawmakers didn’t find Larson’s admission satisfactory, saying they thought he owed them a more forthright mea culpa. “Did you hear an apology?” Rep. Cynthia Browning, D-Arlington, asked afterwards.
One of the central hitches has been the payment system, which will allow people to actually purchase plans. That, Larson said, is still being tested. Another major problem has prevented employees from picking a plan after their employer registers. Larson also acknowledged that navigators hadn’t received sufficient training — “We would have preferred to give navigators more training before October 1.”
Larson also pointing to glimmers of improvement. The speed of the website, which crawled when it first launched, has picked up to the point it “operates at a speed that allows them [users] to function,” Larson said. And enrollment numbers are a testament to the site’s functionality, he said, noting that roughly 16,000 people have set up accounts and over 5,000 have picked a plan.
Mental Health: Mental Health Commissioner Paul Dupre said the state is making progress making more beds available at mental health facilities, but in the meantime, psychiatric patients are still spending as long as 15 days in hospital emergency rooms while they wait for a bed to open up. This problem has been perennial since the Vermont State Hospital was flooded and subsequently shut down after Tropical Storm Irene.
“I know that sounds awful but there’s no way around it at the moment,” Dupre said.
Rep. Martha Heath, D-Westford, who chairs the House Appropriations Committee, told him, “Paul, we’ve put $20 million or more into the community-based system in hopes of beefing up the system, but also preventing the need to fill more acute beds. I’m really worried about the timing. And whether the community system is going to be functional in time that we don’t start overbuilding acute beds and residential recovery beds. What assurances can you give me that we aren’t going to do that?”
Dupre rehashed the challenges the department is facing before telling Heath, “I wish I could give you assurances, but I can’t.”
