By Rachel Lippmann, KWMU
St. Louis, MO – One of Missouri's main business lobbying groups has given its support to Governor Jay Nixon's planned health care expansion.
Under a deal announced in early March, Missouri's hospitals will pay a higher provider tax. The additional revenue will be used to draw down enough federal dollars to expand Medicaid to another 43,000 families by increasing the income limit to 50 percent of the poverty line, up from 20 percent.
The board of the 800-member Associated Industries of Missouri endorsed the plan earlier this week, and president Ray McCarty says the organization is prepared to put its lobbying power behind the compromise.
"We think if we explain this in the right way and people understand that businesses do benefit from this as well that maybe we can convince a few more people to support the plan," he said.
Republican leaders in the Legislature have so far refused to approve the expansion, but Nixon says he's optimistic he'll be able to change minds in the Senate. "So as we sit here today, the merging of health care, the merging of Democrats and Republicans, the business community and also the folks in the Senate, I feel very good about the way this is going in the Senate," he said.