A huge chunk of the CNMI\u2019s money is dependent on the Medicaid program that insures health insurance for low-income families in the Commonwealth but the program\u2019s entitlements are approaching their end.<\/p>\n
According to House of Representatives vice speaker Janet U. Maratita (R-Saipan), she recently introduced a bill that would allocate a portion of the Casino Business Gross Revenue Tax to keeping local Medicaid alive, in the event the federal program ends, reportedly in 2019. <\/p>\n
\u201cI introduced the bill that would put aside 10 percent of the Casino BGRT for the Medicaid program because the Medicaid program will be ending next year in September or October,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
Maratita said she is aware of how vital the Medicaid program is\u2014how many families rely on it\u2014and intends to plan ahead. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe just want to ensure\u2026we need to plan ahead so that hopefully with that funding allocated to Medicaid, it will not hamper the Medicaid program,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
Maratita said the U.S. government, which currently funds 50 percent of the Medicaid program, has decided that it is time that the CNMI funds the program completely. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe [decision] was from the States\u2026that we need to\u2026locally fund it 100 percent\u2026By the year 2024, I believe that the CNMI has to fund the program 100 percent locally so, with this bill, it will ensure that we have 10-percent from the BGRT\u2026to plan ahead,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
Maratita said she was made aware of situation about one month ago and immediately got to work on the bill. <\/p>\n
\u201c[The Commonwealth Healthcare Corp.] informed me as the chair for the local delegation\u2019s health and welfare committee\u2026 and I met with the CEO [Esther Muna] and they advised me on how I could assist and that was how I came up with this bill and also the tax credit for health insurance, which is why we really need this so we don\u2019t have to burden CHCC,\u201d she said, <\/p>\n
Maratita said she is confident in the chances of her bill going through the Legislature, but acknowledges that she would still need to gain the support of the Senate. <\/p>\n
\u201cHopefully next session, it [the bill] will be on the calendar and then we go to Senate but I still need to lobby the bill with the Senate to gain their support,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
Medicaid is a joint federal-state program that provides health coverage or nursing home coverage to certain categories of low-asset people, including children, pregnant women, parents of eligible children, people with disabilities and elderly needing nursing home care.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A huge chunk of the CNMI\u2019s money is dependent on the Medicaid program that insures…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[900],"tags":[7019,402,26,55],"class_list":["post-283148","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-featured","tag-bgrt","tag-ceo","tag-cnmi","tag-health-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283148","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=283148"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283148\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=283148"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=283148"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=283148"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}