House committee advances bill to set up rural health transformation fund and legislative oversight

Representative Jordan Redmond told the Health and Welfare Committee that House Bill 862 would create an Idaho Rural Health Transformation Fund and a legislative oversight committee to review how federal rural-transformation dollars are spent. Redmond said Idaho's Department of Health and Welfare applied for federal funds and "received just shy of $1 billion dollars over the next 5 years," and that the oversight committee would verify sustainability plans from grant applicants. "We would rather than the executive branch and the Department of Health and Welfare being appropriate in distributing these funds, we wanted to have some oversight," Redmond said.

Committee members asked whether the oversight committee would include minority-party representation (Redmond said he had arranged for minority representation) and whether grants that relied on one-time funding would be required to show sustainable support beyond the five-year period. Trevor Carlson, testifying for FGA Action, urged legislative oversight and said, "As a simple matter of good government...Idaho legislators should be in the room for the decisions." Representative Healy moved to send HB862 to the floor with a due-pass recommendation; the chair announced the motion passed (the transcript records three opposing votes).