Division of Medicaid preparing to notify beneficiaries of loss of coverage.

“I think it’s required 30 or 45 days before the July 1 deadline,” longtime state Rep. Bobby Moak said last week of recipients being notified.

State Attorney General Jim Hood said a 2004 federal court opinion mandates that proper notice be given to Medicaid recipients prior to the end of services because of a lack of funding.

“The Mississippi Division of Medicaid continues to hope the Legislature can reach a resolution regarding our reauthorization and funding prior to July 1,” said Medicaid spokeswoman Erin Barham. “However, if that is not the case, we are currently reviewing guidelines regarding the procedure for notifying interested parties of potential impacts. Although we are aware of the situation, when we have more direction we can provide additional information.”

Lawmakers failed to pass reauthorization and funding for Medicaid during the regular session that concluded April 4.

Democratic lawmakers and Republican legislative leaders are trading blame for who is responsible for the stalemate.

“Gov. Bryant regrets the situation Democrats have created by voting several times to withdraw funding and authorization for Medicaid services provided by Mississippi’s nursing homes, hospitals and other facilities,” spokesman Mick Bullock said last week. “He has repeatedly stated that when Democrats are ready to fund and reauthorize the current Medicaid program, he will call a special session so Mississippi can continue providing services to children, pregnant women and aged, blind and disabled adults.”

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Budget estimate revision could happen before House-Senate negotiations.

It is not uncommon for the Legislative Budget Committee to meet late in the session to change the estimate before the House-Senate negotiations, where final decisions on the budget are normally hammered out.

It will be up to House Speaker Philip Gunn, R-Clinton, who is chair of the Budget Committee this year, to decide whether to ask the state’s financial experts to look at the revenue picture and whether to call a meeting of the Legislative Budget Committee to consider revising the estimate.

“I think that is an option that is open and obviously something he is looking into,” said Nathan Wells, Gunn’s chief of staff. “It is a definite possibility.”

If the estimate is changed it probably would be revised upward.

Through February, collections are $132.1 million above the estimate made in April 2012 to construct the budget for the current year. Collections for the current year include $35.2 million from the settlement of lawsuits by Attorney General Jim Hood not factored into the estimate.

Still, without those funds, collections are nearly $100 million above the estimate.

When asked about increasing the estimate in the coming weeks, Senate Appropriations Chair Buck Clarke, R-Hollandale, a member of the Budget Committee, said, “It is an option. I am hoping that revenues continue to improve.”

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Rep. George Flaggs says Medicaid reauthorization should take priority over expansion.

While (Speaker Philip) Gunn and Gov. Phil Bryant say the governor has the authority to run Medicaid by executive order, Flaggs believes they are mistaken. He points to former Gov. Haley Barbour, who tried to run Medicaid by executive order and was blocked when Attorney General Jim Hood got an injunction to prevent him. Medicaid was run by the state courts until the Legislature passed a reauthorization bill.

Flaggs says he wants Gunn, (Democrat Bobby) Moak and Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves to meet this week and come to an agreement on Medicaid. Flaggs, who is retiring this year and is expected to run for mayor of Vicksburg, said he has nothing to gain or lose in the legislative fight and therefore hopes he can get everyone to get on the same page.

“We do not need to put the Medicaid recipients and the providers in jeopardy because of the politics of it,” Flaggs said.

Flaggs said he agrees with Gunn that right now is not the time to expand Medicaid because the final regulations on Disproportionate Share Hospital payments have not been decided by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. But Flaggs said that expansion can easily be voted down right now, and doing so would still allow the reauthorization of Medicaid.

Both Gunn and Reeves have said they oppose Medicaid expansion, but both leaders have left the door open to expansion if the state was to lose money that helps pay for indigent care in Mississippi hospitals. That scenario is likely the only way Mississippi lawmakers would expand the program, and even then it is not guaranteed.

For his part, Flaggs said all he wants right now is a Medicaid reauthorization bill. He said lawmakers can worry about expanding the program later, if the will to do so is there.

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Oh Bill, how we’ve missed your venomous rants!

Mississippi’s grumpy old liberal codger, Bill Minor, is back in old form with a recent attack on Voter ID, Delbert Hosemann and anything Republican. To paraphrase an old expression: he’s old as dirt, but too mean to die.

And who can blame him for being so angry? He’s lived so long that he’s come to realize most of what he’s ranted about and stood for over the years has been proven false.

Enjoy:

Here he goes again – to borrow an expression by a Republican deity – Mississippi’s Secretary of State, Delbert Hosemann, who continues to make banal statements giving the impression that the state’s proposed photo ID voting law is likely to survive federal scrutiny.

That’s not going to happen. The handwriting is already on the wall, as made clear from the D.C. federal court panel’s ruling on the Texas ID law, and the rough treatment South Carolina is getting from the Department of Justice on its photo ID Voter law.

To begin with, because of its history of suppressing minority voting dating back to the post Civil War era, Mississippi is the least likely state to get an OK under the 1965 Voting Rights law to make any voting rights change that smells like the old poll tax.

Furthermore, Hosemann keeps giving the impression he’s in charge of Mississippi’s submission of HB 921, the state’s photo ID voter law, to DOJ, when that is not the case. The 1965 Voting Rights Act designated the state’s chief legal office for DOJ to deal with. Attorney General Jim Hood is Mississippi’s chief legal officer. Though he has been low-key about it, Hood is the one to whom DOJ sends official letters if it asks the state for further information (as it has done) about its proposed voting law change.

That’s why behind the scenes Mississippi’s voter ID law is caught in a big impasse.

Subject yourself to more HERE.

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Mississippi’s Lesbian Circus to take on Ag Museum

Southern Poverty Law Center (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A lesbian who sued her school district in 2010 after she was left out of the high school yearbook for wearing a tuxedo is demanding the Mississippi Agriculture and Forestry Museum permit a commitment ceremony for her and her partner.

The Southern Poverty Law Center sent a letter to the museum on Thursday on behalf of Ceara Sturgis, 20, and threatened to sue if the facility doesn’t allow Sturgis and her partner, 19-year-old Emily Key, to hold the ceremony there on Aug. 11.

The letter said Sturgis and her mother, Veronica Rodriguez, are both from Jackson and want the ceremony at the museum’s Masonic Hall so friends and relatives can attend.

The state-owned museum refused to allow a similar ceremony for two men earlier this year.

The museum has said it interprets commitment ceremonies to represent a union and cites a 2009 opinion by Attorney General Jim Hood saying it could decline such ceremonies because same-sex marriage is banned in Mississippi.

Mississippi Agriculture Commissioner Cindy Hyde-Smith said Thursday that she was out of the office and had not seen the letter.

The SPLC is not challenging Mississippi’s ban on same-sex marriage, but says the museum should allow commitment and marriage ceremonies to take place even if the couple won’t be recognized under state law.

“The Museum’s policy is premised on a misguided and erroneous interpretation of Mississippi state law and, further, violates the United States Constitution. We intend to challenge the Museum’s policy in federal court if the Museum does not rescind its policy against same-sex commitment and marriage ceremonies and honor our clients’ request,” the letter said.

via Lesbian demands ceremony at ag museum | Hattiesburg American | hattiesburgamerican.com.

Despite claim of victory, some Mississippi attorney fee issues remain unresolved

Last month, state Auditor Stacey Pickering and Gov. Phil Bryant claimed victory in their lawsuit to recoup attorneys’ fees provided to private lawyers hired by Attorney General Jim Hood to do legal work on behalf of the state. But Pickering concedes that despite what he called “a victory not for me, but the taxpayers,” there might still be some issues to resolve in the legal fees dispute.

In two cases, by a 6-3 decision in one case and by a 5-3 decision in another, the state’s high court ruled that when the attorney general’s office contracts with private attorneys to handle lawsuits on a contingency fee basis, the fees cannot be paid directly to the attorneys.

Bryant, when he was auditor, instigated the lawsuit, claiming the contingency fees were actually part of the lawsuit settlement and were thus public funds that had to be appropriated by the Legislature. Lawmakers, he said, would have the “prerogative to always determine proper payments and appropriate that amount.”

In separate cases, in chancery and circuit court, judges had said the funds did not have to be appropriated by the Legislature, but could be paid directly to the attorneys who handled the lawsuit on behalf of the state. The Supreme Court essentially is sending the issue back to the Hinds County courts with the instruction to resolve the issue based on the high court’s majority opinion.

For that reason, Pickering and Bryant claimed victory.

In the majority opinion, Southern District Justice Jess Dickinson said the private attorneys must be paid through an appropriation of the Legislature or through the attorney general’s contingent fund.

A concurring opinion written by Southern District Justice Randy Pierce said, “No one has challenged the right of the attorney general to deposit settlement funds into his contingent fund and pay retained counsel therefrom … Had the attorney general paid outside counsel using his contingent fund, we would not be here today.”

The three dissenters on the Supreme Court agreed that the money should have been deposited in the attorney general’s contingent fund with the rest of the settlement money and then disbursed to the private attorneys from there. But they said it “would, at best, be an inefficient and totally symbolic gesture” to require those steps at this stage in the process.

The question then appears to be whether, based on the High Court decision, the lower court will rule that the funds paid the attorneys must be deposited with the state and appropriated to the attorneys by the Legislature as Bryant originally argued or whether the fees can be put in the attorney general’s contingent fund and then returned to the attorneys.

In other words, the Supreme Court appears to have given the attorney general a path to enter into contingency fee contracts with private attorneys without having to depend on the Legislature – where nothing is a certainty – to appropriate the money for the legal fees.

via Attorney Fee Issues Unresolved | LoanSafe.

Investigator: Threatening calls to Mississippi lawmaker came from a New Jersey cell phone

Map of Mississippi highlighting Simpson County (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A sheriffs department says threatening calls made to a Mississippi lawmaker came from a cellphone with a New Jersey area code.

Republican Rep. Andy Gipson of Braxton said he and his family received death threats in mid-May after he posted Bible verses on Facebook to express his opposition to same-sex marriage.

Gipson doesnt have caller identification on his home phone, so he asked investigators to pull his phone records.

Simpson County Lt. Brian Buckley told The Clarion-Ledger that Gipson received several calls from the same number. Buckley said the phone records for the New Jersey number could be subpoenaed, which will help identify the service carrier and the phones owner.

“The problem that we might come into is if this is one of the throw-away phones you can buy at Walmart,” Buckley said.

Buckley said he plans to seek assistance from the state attorney generals office or a federal agency.

Jan Schaefer, spokeswoman for Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood, said that without complete facts about the calls made to Gipson, she couldnt comment on whether the calls might violate the states law against cyber stalking.

Gipson is an attorney and Baptist minister. Hes also chairman of the Mississippi House Judiciary B Committee.

via Investigator: Threatening calls to Mississippi lawmaker came from a New Jersey cell phone.

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CL: AG bill: Waste of taxpayers’ money

The new Mississippi House Republican majority voting to limit Democratic Attorney General Jim Hood’s power would be almost comical, if it weren’t so potentially disruptive.

Comical or not, the House on Wednesday voted 59-55 to allow state agencies to hire their own attorneys.

The politics of the move is obvious. A Republican-majority House has voted to sanction the lone Democratic statewide elected official. Everyone understands the politics. But what is hard to understand is the willingness of lawmakers to play politics with something that could have so much negative impact on the legal operations of state government.

This bill would remove the legal decisions from the state’s chief legal officer to agency heads. Proponents say agency heads need to be able to hire outside lawyers without Hood’s approval. Why would agency heads want to go around the AG? Could the reason be, again, politics?

via AG bill: Waste of taxpayers’ money | The Clarion-Ledger | clarionledger.com.

House panel snubs Hoods effort to testify on bill

Image via Wikipedia

Attorney General Jim Hood is steamed because a state House committee wouldnt let him testify on a bill that would cut his authority. Under the bill, any state agency would be able to hire its own lawyer without Hoods approval.

The House Judiciary Committee voted 13-10 Tuesday to approve the bill, setting it up for a vote of the full House as early as Thursday.

Republicans have been trying for years to limit Hoods authority, now the lone Democrat in statewide office. They had discussed ways to inhibit him from hiring lawyers to pursue large cases against corporations. But Tuesdays bill instead gives every other agency head the ability to hire lawyers without Hoods approval any time that an agency head finds that Hood cant adequately represent the agency.

via House panel snubs Hoods effort to testify on bill – WLOX-TV and WLOX.com – The News for South Mississippi.

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Mississippi Republicans challenge powers of attorney general

Image via Wikipedia

As Mississippi’s attorney general, Jim Hood rarely shies away from litigation, especially when victory could put millions of dollars into the state treasury. During more than eight years in office, Hood has reinforced Mississippi’s reputation as one of the nation’s fiercest litigants, especially on the securities front. In the name of the state’s pension system, he’s taken on around two dozen corporations, including Bank of America and Boston Scientific. All together, he’s netted the state more than $500 million in penalties and settlements.

But some Mississippi lawmakers say that too much of the money ends up going to the private lawyers Hood hires for extra help. Private attorneys representing Mississippi can receive up to a quarter of corporate payouts, which often means millions of dollars.

That money comes through contingency fee contracts, arrangements in which private attorneys — if victorious — receive a healthy slice of a court award or settlement. If the state loses, it pays no fees. Attorneys are usually willing to accept this arrangement instead of charging an hourly rate. In fact, Mississippi leads the nation in contingency fee contracts. For the state, it’s a no-lose deal, supporters say. The contracts draw the attention of high-quality lawyers for big cases.

“There are certainly pros to the arrangement,” says Ben Cooper, a professor of law at the University of Mississippi. “We’re talking about cases that are big and expensive to litigate.” The attorney general alone doesn’t always have the resources to take on other high-priced legal teams, Cooper says.

Transparent goals

Mississippi’s biggest payout came before Hood’s time in office. In 1997, the state received $4.1 billion as part of a national settlement between states and tobacco companies, recouping health care costs associated with smoking. Of Mississippi’s share in that settlement, private attorneys were paid $1.45 billion.

Many state lawmakers — mostly Republicans — are hoping to change the system. Within a week, Republicans plan to introduce legislation likely to include caps on private-firm contingency fees and provide for open bidding on the contracts. That’s partly because the fees are too high, the legislators say, but also because of the close personal and political relationships between the attorney general and the attorneys he hires.

via Mississippi Republicans challenge powers of attorney general.

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