{"id":9,"date":"2016-04-18T20:31:00","date_gmt":"2016-04-18T20:31:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/2016\/04\/18\/will-arkansas-works-work-this-week\/"},"modified":"2017-06-20T16:16:15","modified_gmt":"2017-06-20T16:16:15","slug":"will-arkansas-works-work-this-week","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/2016\/04\/18\/will-arkansas-works-work-this-week\/","title":{"rendered":"Will “Arkansas Works” Work This Week?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n<\/a><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nLegislators will return to Little Rock tomorrow
\nto begin the second week of the regular fiscal session of the Arkansas General
\nAssembly.  Funding the appropriation for the
\nArkansas Works program, which was passed two weeks ago with a simple majority
\nin a special legislative session, is the governor\u2019s plan for Medicaid expansion
\nin Arkansas. It will certainly be at the center of the debate again this week.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nThe appropriation bill (SB121) to fund Arkansas
\nWorks is contained in the overall budget for the DHS Division of Medical
\nServices. Attempts to fund SB121 were derailed last week when an amendment to
\nthe bill failed to make it out of the Joint Budget Committee.  The amendment, which actually de-funds
\nArkansas Works, would allow senators who have been opposing the program to cast
\na vote for the appropriation in good conscience.  The Arkansas Constitution of 1874 requires a
\n\u00be majority of both houses to pass an appropriation. Under this plan, the
\nGovernor could actually line-item veto the amendment, which would enable the
\noriginal funding for Arkansas Works to be reinstated. An override of a
\nGovernor\u2019s veto requires only a simple majority of both houses.  <\/div>\n
\n

It\u2019s a long way to go
\naround the barn to pass much-needed legislation, but neither the governor nor
\nthis group of senators has indicated they will compromise on funding the
\nappropriation.  Will the governor get the
\nvotes for the amendment in committee? Assuming that he does, will the governor
\nget the required votes for passage and for defeating the subsequent veto
\noverride? Will the legislative Democrats, who have been long-time supporters of
\nMedicaid expansion and have seen their numbers dwindle in the last few years because
\nof this being used as a campaign issue against them, go along with the governor\u2019s
\nplan?  Will this override plan survive a threatened
\nlegal challenge, which is a possibility that has been talked about, as
\nwell?  Will this solution hold? We will definitely
\nknow the answers to most of these complicated questions by the end of this
\nweek.\ufeff<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Legislators will return to Little Rock tomorrow to begin the second week of the regular fiscal session of the Arkansas General Assembly.  Funding the appropriation for the Arkansas Works program, which was passed two weeks ago with a simple majority in a special legislative session, is the governor\u2019s plan for Medicaid expansion in Arkansas. It […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":108,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-chambernews"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/veto-schoolhouse-rock-bill380.png?fit=200%2C150","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8RhO8-9","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":109,"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9\/revisions\/109"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/108"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}