Agreement on 2025-27 state budget would boost Medicaid funding
Legislators are moving quickly to pass the state’s 2025-27 budget after reaching a deal to provide an additional $1.4 billion in state money to continue funding the current Medicaid program.
The Legislature’s budget-writing committee signed off on the two-year spending plan Tuesday. Both chambers are scheduled to take it up Wednesday.
Under the plan, the state would cover the projected cost-to-continue costs for Medicaid, which is based on estimated enrollment and costs for providing care. That includes continuing a fee schedule that boosted rates for some long-term care providers, an effort previously supported with temporary federal COVID-19 relief dollars.
The budget would triple the hospital assessment to 6 percent, allowing the state to draw down additional federal funds. About 30 percent of the generated funds would head to the Medicaid trust fund, and $1.1 billion would go to Wisconsin hospitals.
Gov. Tony Evers’ office said that the state’s 2025-27 budget may be the last chance the state has to make the policy change as a federal tax-and-spending bill that passed the U.S. Senate Tuesday would place restrictions on provider taxes.
The spending plan includes Medicaid rate increases for personal care services, OB care, private duty nursing, chiropractic services, sedation dentistry, opioid use disorder treatment and home health agencies.
“We have landed in a really good spot,” Joint Finance Committee member Sen. Patrick Testin, R-Stevens Point, told reporters. “We have proven that Republicans and Democrats alike are meeting the needs and making critical investments to deliver healthcare in every corner of the state.”
“The people of Wisconsin expect their leaders to show up, work hard and operate in good faith to get good things done,” Democratic Gov. Tony Evers said in a statement.
Joint Finance Committee Democrats pushed for taking federal dollars to expand Medicaid. Sen. Kelda Roys, D-Madison, called the state’s 2025-27 budget the “last opportunity” for the state to get the “full benefit” of expansion. She noted that the bill under consideration in Congress could result in large coverage losses. Republicans rejected expansion.
The approved budget deal would provide additional funding for free and charitable clinics, community health centers, independent living centers, healthcare and long-term care provider training grants, and dental care providers working with low-income and underserved populations.
It would support Rogers Behavioral Health in developing a health campus in the Chippewa Valley and Lutheran Social Services of Wisconsin and Upper Michigan in reopening a substance use disorder treatment facility in Chippewa Falls, following western Wisconsin hospital closures last year.
It would provide funding for the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, virtual mental health services for Universities of Wisconsin students and an eye institute at the Medical College of Wisconsin.
The deal would increase special education reimbursement rates further than Republican lawmakers proposed earlier in this budget cycle. And it would continue to provide $30 million over the biennium for school mental health grants instead of cutting them.
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