In June, Washington Governor Gary Locke announced a one-year delay in implementing children’s Medicaid premiums. This is the latest victory in Washington Citizen Action’s long fight to defeat efforts by the state to slash the state’s largest health coverage program. In 2002, WCA and allied organizations defeated an effort by the Washington Department of Social and Health Services to obtain a blanket waiver of federal Medicaid protections. DSHS drafted a series of narrower and narrower proposals to cut services, cap eligibility and increase costs – and scrapped them in response to growing grassroots opposition.

Finally, in July 2003, the Legislature decided to charge premiums for enrollment of low-income children in Medicaid, hoping to cut costs by driving children out of the program and into the ranks of the uninsured. During the 2004 legislative session, WCA and others lobbied against the premiums. In response to this pressure, the Legislature scaled back the premiums, deciding to impose them on a smaller group of children, with implementation scheduled for July 1 of this year. Grassroots opposition against the plans continued to grow and, last week, Democratic gubernatorial candidate and current Attorney General Christine Gregoire sent the Governor a letter urging him to hold off on the premiums. He agreed to delay implementation for one year. WCA will continue to campaign for the premiums to be eliminated entirely.