Wednesday, February 17, 2016

Dispatches From Bevinstan, Con't

Matt Bevin Old and Brokedown: "Kynect is unsustainable and is gone."

Matt Bevin New Hottness: "Meet your new state medicaid benefits exchange, Benefind!"

Kentucky Medicaid beneficiaries and other welfare recipients will apply for services using a new website called Benefind starting Feb. 29.

Medicaid recipients previously applied for benefits using Kynect, the state health exchange that Gov. Matt Bevin has promised to dismantle by the end of the year.

Health and Human Services Cabinet Vickie Yates Glisson said the plan does away with the paper-version of the application — the program will be entirely online.

“Whether you live in any of our 120 counties, there should be access to a computer system that you will be able to come in and access these programs,” Glisson said.

The new program will also serve as an application hub for other state health, food and cash assistance programs, replacing the Kentucky Automated Management Eligibility System.

So, totally not Kynect.  Nope.  Meanwhile, Bevin's proposed tax cuts are running into reality.

Meanwhile the state’s new Medicaid commissioner said that the cost of the Medicaid program — one of the largest expenditures in the budget —will cost about 20 percent more over the next two years, rising to over $3.7 billion

Rep. Jim Wayne, another Louisville Democrat, said that the state could afford these programs and more if it revised its tax system.

“If people who are as wealthy as the governor would pay their fair share in state and local taxes, we know that these type of programs could easily be sustainable,” Wayne said.

So either Bevin gets his tax cuts, or he'll throw 20% of state Medicaid people off the rolls.  Guess which one this sudden change of state benefits in two weeks to an all online site does in a state with one of the lowest percentages of home internet use in America?

Guess what happens?

You tell me.

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