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Idaho Medicaid budget rises; department seeks supplementals and ongoing increases
Summary
Legislative analyst and Department of Health and Welfare staff detailed fiscal-year 2025 supplementals and 2026 enhancements for Idaho Medicaid, citing pandemic-era impacts, provider rate increases and forecasting changes as drivers of higher costs.
The Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee heard Feb. 26 that Idaho’s Medicaid program is requesting multiple supplemental and ongoing budget increases to cover recent costs and anticipated growth.
Alex Williamson, budget and policy analyst with Legislative Services, told the committee the Division of Medicaid expended about $4,270,000,000 of the $4,560,000,000 appropriated in fiscal 2024, and presented five supplementals and several 2026 enhancement requests. “This will probably feel like information overload,” Williamson said as she introduced the materials.
Why it matters: Medicaid is the state’s largest health-care expenditure and a joint state–federal entitlement program. The department and the analyst said a mix of factors has driven costs above previous forecasts: implementation of Medicaid expansion, the COVID-19 public-health emergency, provider rate increases passed by the Legislature, changes to upper payment limit (UPL) calculations and population growth.
Key supplemental and enhancement requests described to JFAC: - External quality review (EQR) supplemental: Williamson said the department requests a one-time amount…
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