The Denver Business Journal reports:
Colorado House Republicans temporarily have blocked the Colorado Health Benefit Exchange board from applying for a $22 million grant that would have been used to set up the technology infrastructure needed to operate an online health insurance marketplace beginning in 2014. …
Rep. Jim Kerr, a Littleton Republican and review committee member, said in a statement that GOP members were very concerned about the requirements to accede to federal law. “This current application would push Colorado into a one-size-fits-all mandate from Washington,” Kerr said. “Colorado needs Colorado-specific solutions to meet our Colorado-specific needs. That’s why we created a health benefit exchange to fit the unique needs of Colorado and to protect Coloradans from an out-of-control Washington, D.C., bureaucracy.”
Read the whole article: House GOP move stalls health reform action.
Kerr is correct. See these posts:
- Colorado’s health insurance exchange: controlled by Feds, limited choice
- Colorado SB 11-200: Feds will control the insurance exchange
- Politically-controlled exchanges & ACOs are about authoritarian control, not competition & accountability
- State-run insurance exchange enables federal control of Coloradans’ insurance
