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Nov

14

Mental Health Parity: Ohio State Sen. Stivers’ hypocrisy


You know, it’s things like this that must drive a minority party insane.

I’ve just listened to the entire 39 minutes of video around Ohio SB5, heard in the Ohio State Senate this afternoon. Senator Eric Fingerhut had bi-partisan support for his amendment to require mental health parity coverage in small businesses. See Senate Bill 5′s analysis for more information. Even my Republican State Senator, Bob Spada, supported it.

So what happens? Senator Steve Stivers gets up and says, well, all the plans that fall under ERISA won’t be required to offer that parity so let’s table the amendment, get it back to my committee, figure out how to get the ERISA-covered plans in, and then, if we can’t figure out how to do that, we’ll always have the amendment as a fallback.

So, the Ohio Senate votes 18 to 13 to table Fingerhut’s amendment.

Then, Fingerhut says, okay, fine – let’s take Stivers at face value, even though no other state has yet to figure out how to get around ERISA’s exemptions, and vote to re-commit the entire process (including tabling SB5 I believe), to hearing in Stivers’ committee.

What’s the vote on that? With Stivers voting against what he just said he’d do when he asked to have Fingerhut’s amendment tabled?

The vote to re-commit to Stivers’ committee, to come up with the grand solution including ERISA plans, fails, 19 to 12, again, with Stivers’ voting not to let it be heard in his committee. Even though he’d just said he took the issue seriously and wanted to solve the problem.

In the end? SB5 passes 30 to 1. Thirty to one. I actually didn’t hear who the one was, the sound just wasn’t good enough (audible enough). I would guess that the one who voted against sb5 is Fingerhut, but I don’t know.

Sad. Very, very, very sad. I don’t wish people ill, but those folks who didn’t want to get mental health parity in, even at the level of SB5 – may you never, ever, ever – for yourself or a loved one – go broke trying to get treatment for a mental illness. Shame on you.

And – a PS thought: given how depressed Ohio’s Republicans seem to be feeling right now, you’d think Stivers would’ve given them a lift by approving financial help, in case they try to get by with a little help of the mental health varity.

And a PPS: I loved how Senator Ray Miller pointed out that the members of the Ohio legislature have mental health parity coverage, or he implied that the coverage was at parity. He said to not approve the amendment would be “disingenuous and inequitable.” To put it mildly.

Harrumph.

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By Jill Miller Zimon at 3:33 pm November 14th, 2006 in Politics 

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