[LFC Comments: It is raining money in Congress…take a look at proposed spending. Local Lake County officials are calling it monopoly money!. A billion here and a billion there, pretty soon you are talking about some real money. To borrow a phrase from the left – this is not sustainable. Looks like the teachers’ and the government pension plans will be made whole. And guess who will pay for it?]
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Subject: Legislative Update – State and Federal
Today at the Statehouse….Senate Bill 22 Passes House, Senate Concurs
Today, the full Ohio House passed amended substitute Senate Bill 22 with 57 positive votes, as sent to the floor by the House State and Local Government Committee. Later this afternoon, the full Senate concurred on the changes made by the House, after a bit of dialogue on the floor. The bill now goes onto Governor DeWine for signature. We expect the Governor to announce his intent to veto the bill, as early as tomorrow. His veto will set the stage for both chambers, beginning with the Senate, to consider a veto override.
A big THANK YOU to everyone for taking time out of your busy day today to reach out to your State legislators regarding SB 22!
Meanwhile, Good News at the Federal Level
Today, the US House of Representatives took the final step to pass the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, H.R. 1319. The President is expected to sign the bill into law on Friday. NACCHO provided a very high level summary of the bill’s major provisions in support of public health:
- $46 billion in funding to the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) to detect, diagnose, trace, monitor and mitigate COVID-19 infections.
- $7.5 billion in funding for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to support vaccine related activities to prepare, promote, distribute, administer, monitor, and track COVID-19 vaccines.
- $7.66 billion in funding to HHS to establish, expand, and sustain a public health workforce
- $130 billion for payments to metropolitan cities, non-entitlement units of local government (populations under 50,000), and counties to mitigate the fiscal effects from the pandemic. [LFC Comment: Wow, that will buy a lot of masks. This will be used to shore up their underfunded pensions.]
- $100 million to the Medical Reserve Corps — two-thirds housed in local health departments — to better facilitate volunteer response efforts.
Stay tuned for more details, on both fronts!
Association of Ohio Health Commissioners
110A Northwoods Blvd.
Columbus, OH 43235
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Categories: National News, State of Ohio