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Committee backs amended measures to stabilize Fund for Healthy Maine
Summary
The Health & Human Services Committee recommended 'ought to pass as amended' on two related bills that create a stabilization subaccount for the Fund for Healthy Maine and credit a share of tobacco excise and disputed settlement receipts to it; the committee narrowed changes to preserve legislative budget authority.
The joint standing Committee on Health and Human Services recommended passing amended measures intended to stabilize the Fund for Healthy Maine, the panel’s chairs said after a work session that focused on revised funding mechanics rather than new taxes.
Analyst Sam Seneff summarized LD 1658 and LD 1772, explaining the amendment to LD 1658 would direct the state controller to transfer a percentage of cigarette and tobacco-product excise tax revenue to the Fund for Healthy Maine (starting at 14% in fiscal year ending 06/30/2028, rising one percentage point per year to a 20% cap in 2034). Seneff said the change replaces an earlier, rate‑increase approach and does not raise the statutory excise tax rate.
Carol Kelly, a public health consultant working with the Maine Public Health Association, told the committee the Fund receives revenue from multiple streams — Master Settlement Agreement payments, racino receipts and tribal gaming receipts — and that disputed settlement payments are the most volatile. She described a stabilization subaccount funded initially by two years of unallocated disputed payments and thereafter by a 10% credit of future disputed payments to reduce reliance on the current working capital advance from the General Fund.
Several committee members supported the stabilization subaccount but opposed creating an independent, quasi‑governmental commission referred to in earlier drafts. Senator Mary Anne Moore and other members emphasized that any spending from the Fund for Healthy Maine would remain subject to legislative appropriation and that the subaccount is a part of the existing fund rather than a separate entity.
Representative Michelle Meyer moved, with Senator Moore seconding, that LD 1658 be reported 'ought to pass as amended.' The committee then took the same approach to LD 1772, approving the stabilization‑account language while asking staff to remove the commission references and return revised bill text.
The committee advanced both measures by voice vote during the work session; the transcript records the motions and voice approvals but does not include a roll‑call tally in the hearing record. Chair Henry Ingwersen closed the morning work session and directed staff to draft the final amended language for committee review.
What happens next: the committee requested revised bill language to remove the commission elements and to reconcile cross references between LD 1658 and LD 1772; any future use of the stabilization subaccount would still require legislative appropriation under existing statute.
