This fiscal year, the Department of Health and Hospitals suffered a $855,256 decrease in funds in the Florida Parishes. Two constitutional amendments have been added to the Nov. 4 ballot to help keep this from happening in the future. 

The first amendment would “give constitutional protection to provisions in the Louisiana Medical Assistance Trust-Fund and set a baseline compensation rate for nursing homes and certain other healthcare providers that pay a provider fee,” according to parlouisiana.org.

This means the Louisiana Medical Assistance fund would no longer be able to have money taken from it to be put into other funds, and there would be a minimum amount the government must pay to healthcare providers every year based on Medicaid and inflation. The amendment provides a base amount that must be budgeted for the Louisiana Medical Trust Fund each year, and it would be protected by the constitution, only to be changed or eradicated by another constitutional amendment.

On the ballot, the amendment will read “medical trust fund and healthcare provider base rate.”

This amendment would not only provide a great deal of security to the funding of healthcare, but also provide assurance that all patients will be able to get treated more effectively without the fear of swaying the budget. On the other hand, it would make the state budget exponentially less flexible and would require the Louisiana state government to take money from other portions of the state budget.

Higher education would be suffering a significant decrease in funds because healthcare and higher education are the only places in the budget that other sanctions can still take from. If healthcare is protected, higher education will be the only place that can sacrifice its budget for other state-funded programs, and the fund will end up getting depleted far too quickly.  

Such provisions should be kept to an absolute minimum because they will not only have an effect on the quality of education within Louisiana universities, but it will also likely decrease the amount of funding for the Taylor Opportunity Program for Students, or TOPS. This will discourage and disable students from attending college, and will in turn jeopardize the economy in a multitude of ways. Not to mention, there will be less people qualified for the healthcare positions they are trying so desperately to protect. While this may benefit the economy for the time being, the effects could be catastrophic if it continues too long. 

The second amendment on the ballot will regard the creation of a Hospital Stability fund by “draw[ing] down more federal Medicaid dollars for the institutions,” according to parlouisiana.org.

It is argued by the Louisiana Hospital Association that Medicaid only pays about 60 percent of the bills generated by an uninsured patient. This fund would be to compensate for what Medicaid does not cover. Many other states already have funds like this. 

It is arguable that this too will negatively impact the other parts of the budget, including higher education, but according to the Thibodaux Daily Comet, president and CEO of the Louisiana Hospital Association Paul Salles, “This is not about taking anyone else’s money. Our motivation for this is protecting services in the community.”

The second amendment would not take as much of a financial toll as the first because it has a significantly more specific purpose, and it has room for revision to avoid damaging the economy.