Jindal cites priorities

• By MICHELLE MILLHOLLON
• Advocate Capitol News Bureau
• Published: Jan 9, 2009 - Page: 1A - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

• Print
• Email
• Save
• Twitter
• Social Media

• Del.icio.us
• Digg
• Facebook
• Reddit
• 

Gov. Bobby Jindal told a business crowd Thursday he plans to focus on health care, high school dropouts, sex offenders and higher education funding in the new year.

Jindal outlined his plans for 2009 at the annual meeting of the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry, called LABI, in Baton Rouge.

The governor will have to pursue his proposals under tight financial constraints because of falling oil prices and a faltering economy.

The Jindal administration is projecting a $2 billion budget shortfall to continue services and to pay for increased costs in the fiscal year that starts July 1.

In the current year’s $30 billion budget, the governor had to cut $341 million in state general fund spending.

“A shortage of money will not stop us from changing Louisiana,” the governor told LABI.

Jindal already is working on a restructuring of the way the state delivers health care to the poor and uninsured.

Among other things, the governor wants to provide health insurance coverage to an additional 100,000 people.

The biggest part of Jindal’s proposal is a change in the way the state pays for the treatment of the poor and uninsured. Now, the state directly pays doctors and other medical providers.

The governor wants to set up a system in which the government money is paid to private insurance-like companies that would oversee and provide health care to Medicaid members.

The health-care plan is awaiting federal vetting. If approved, the proposal comes back to the Louisiana Legislature for approval.

Jindal said the goal is to rein in the cost of treating the uninsured and to decrease a dependency on costly emergency rooms for basic ailments.

The governor’s other three plans for the new year center on education.