provider rates<\/a>.<\/p>\nWhat are provider rates?<\/p>\n
It\u2019s what the state pays to those who provide services to Coloradans in health care covered by Medicaid, including medical, dental, children\u2019s and behavioral health.<\/p>\n
Providers have claimed for years that the rates don\u2019t come close to covering the costs of those services.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It hasn\u2019t fallen on deaf ears at the state Capitol: Joint Budget Committee members have worked for several years to increase those rates, including a 1.6% increase in the 2025-26 state budget.<\/p>\n
However, this has drawn concerns from Polis, who sought cuts to provider rates in his budget submission for 2025-26 and presented it to budget writers last November. That recommendation was for about $40 million in provider rate cuts, including $19 million for pediatric behavioral health services.\u00a0<\/p>\n
That followed the actions of the JBC and the legislature in the 2024-25 budget, when the JBC decided to hike provider rates for Medicaid above both the governor\u2019s recommendation and the JBC staff\u2019s recommendation.<\/p>\n
Those rates have been so low that it has raised concerns that Medicaid patients may struggle to find the care they need. Last November, Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer, R-Brighton, the ranking Republican on the JBC, said 25 counties don\u2019t have any maternal healthcare, a statement she repeated during the special session. Community mental health clinics are eliminating services and laying off staff, in part because of insufficient provider rates, she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Kirkmeyer warned during the special session that she believed the governor would go after provider rates with his budget cuts, a concern also shared by other JBC members, including its chair, Sen. Jeff Bridges, D-Greenwood Village.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A chart showing the impact of those provider rate cuts on pediatric home health services, including for children with autism.<\/p>\n
Polis and the Joint Budget Committee will meet at 2 p.m. Thursday to discuss the budget cuts.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The most significant cuts to the state budget, as contained in the spending reduction plan that Gov. Jared…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":117013,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[75686,97,252,253],"class_list":["post-117012","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health-care","tag-budget-deficits","tag-health","tag-health-care","tag-healthcare"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117012","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=117012"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117012\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/117013"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=117012"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=117012"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=117012"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}