Subsidized-insurance plan may start sooner

AUGUSTA — On the last day of a brief legislative recess, the Appropriations Committee was told Wednesday that a new subsidized-insurance program could start up by the end of the year, at least three months earlier than envisioned in Gov. John R. McKernan’s pending budget package.

The shortened delay in implementing the Maine Health Program, which would provide coverage for thousands of people unable to afford their own, was announced jointly by administration officials, legislators and a coalition of private groups.

But the informal working group told the budget panel that it needed more time to see if a December start-up could be advanced even further.

Sen. Michael D. Pearson, the Appropriations Committee co-chairman who is among the Democrats pushing for earlier implementation, told business regulation Commissioner Susan M. Collins, Rep. Charlene B. Rydell and other negotiators to continue to discuss funding methods for a September start-up.

“Work hard. Work longer. Look deeper,” Pearson said toward the end of an afternoon-long deliberative session that appeared to leave the committee well short of firming up its refinements to McKernan’s plan to offset a $210-million revenue shortfall through mid-1991.

The health-care program originally was to take effect this July, financed by a series of tax increases that began taking effect last fall, but McKernan proposed putting it off for nine months to generate savings of $12 million.

Negotiators now say a combination of federal program changes and state restructuring could in effect stretch General Fund money still committed to the Maine plan, enabling officials to get it up and running by sometime in December.

Meeting with McKernan on Wednesday was a group of local educators and students — this one from the Fairfield area — urging restorations in school funding even if it means increasing taxes.

But, according to the president of the SAD 49 teachers association, Robert Mealey, McKernan offered no give on his no-tax pledge, which, in effect, has been accepted by Democratic leadership.

“Local school districts are going to have to cut their budgets, that’s basically what he said,” Mealey said.

The McKernan administration, whose budget-balancing plan envisions a $31-million reduction in education-related subsidies, says that state aid to local schools will still increase by about 10 percent next year.