Volume 6, Number 6
In this Issue:
Expansion of Children’s Health Insurance Passes in House and Senate
Update on FY 2008 Appropriations
Home Visitation Bill Gains Cosponsors - More Congressional Support Needed
Updates on Additional Prevention Bills
---The Shaken Baby Syndrome Prevention Act
---The Early Childhood Investment Act of 2007
---The Safe Babies Act of 2007
---The Safe Schools Improvement Act
Expansion of Children’s Health Insurance Passes in House and Senate
Following a week of delay tactics in the House and prolonged floor debate in the Senate, at the beginning of August both the House and Senate passed bills that would reauthorize and expand the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) for the next five years. This is a huge step towards a major victory for millions of families unable to afford health insurance coverage for their children.
The House-passed expansion (a $50 billion increase over 5 years) would expand coverage to approximately 5 million additional children and the version passed by the Senate (a $35 billion increase over 5 years) would expand coverage to approximately 4 million additional children.
Aside from the difference in overall funding level, the House bill (H.R. 3162, also referred to as the Children’s Health and Medicare Protection Act or CHAMP) and Senate bill (S. 1893) have some other significant differences. While the Senate bill would require a lower match for states seeking to expand coverage to children above 300% of the federal poverty level, the House bill does not contain any income eligibility limits. The expansion in the Senate bill would be paid for entirely through a 61-cent increase in the federal tobacco tax, and in the House bill would be paid for by combining a tobacco tax increase and phasing out overpayments to private insurers that provide Medicare plans (who currently receive an average of 12% more money per patient than traditional Medicare plans). The House bill also would allow states to provide SCHIP coverage to legal immigrant children and pregnant women who have been in the U.S. fewer than 5 years, a group that is not covered by SCHIP in its current form. The Senate bill does not contain any such provision, and would maintain the current rules that do not allow legal immigrant children and pregnant women to be covered by SCHIP until they have been in the U.S. for 5 years or more. Families USA has created a helpful side-by-side comparison of the House and Senate bills, which can be downloaded at:
http://chn.org/pdf/2007/House&Senatesidebyside.pdf.
Next Steps:
Following the August congressional recess, a House-Senate conference committee will need to reconcile the differences between the two bills and produce a single version of the bill to send to the President’s desk. The President, who has called expansion of SCHIP “a step towards socialized medicine,” has repeatedly threatened to veto a reauthorization of SCHIP that authorizes spending above the $5 billion over 5 years that the Administration originally proposed. While the 225-204 House vote was essentially along party lines, the Senate bill garnered strong bipartisan support and passed by an impressive 68-31 vote, a margin that would be large enough to override the President’s threatened veto. It will be crucial for the House-Senate conference committee to come up with a compromise that has enough bipartisan support to deter a Presidential veto.
Update on FY 2008 Appropriations
The House has passed its Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education (Labor-HHS-Ed) spending bill (H.R. 3043) for FY 2008, while the Senate bill (S. 1710) is still awaiting a floor vote by the full Senate. In the House, Democrats were joined by 53 Republicans in support of this legislation, resulting in a final vote of 276 to 140. The Labor-HHS-Ed bill is the largest of the annual spending bills Congress passes, and it contains the majority of the funding for child abuse and neglect prevention.
The bill passed by the House includes $151.6 billion in annual appropriations, a spending level that exceeds the Administration’s request by nearly $11 billion, prompting the President to issue a veto threat. Details of the President’s concerns with the bill are contained within a Statement of Administration Policy (SAP) on H.R. 3043. Among other issues, the SAP includes the House’s decision to level fund the Social Services Block Grant (SSBG) at $1.7 billion rather than cut the program by $500 million, as proposed in the President’s budget request. SSBG is a capped entitlement that funds a range of social services including child abuse prevention. HHS reports that SSBG funded preventive services for 29 percent of the total child recipients of those services in 2004. Prevent Child Abuse America supports the House’s decision to fully fund SSBG.
The Senate bill awaiting passage offers a slightly lower overall spending level, coming in at approximately $9 billion over the Administration’s request. Like the House, the Senate bill fully funds SSBG at $1.7 billion. Another point of contention is a provision currently included in the Senate bill that would expand federal funding for embryonic stem cell research, which would almost certainly prompt a veto if it is included in the bill that reaches the President's desk.
For a summary of funding levels for prevention programs included in the House and Senate bills, see the June Prevention Advocate.
Next Steps in the Appropriations Process:
A Senate floor vote may take place after Congress returns from August recess, though a specific date has yet to be scheduled. If this happens and the Senate passes their bill, select House and Senate appropriators will then conference to reconcile the differences between their respective spending bills, resulting in a single bill that will be sent to the President, who will either sign or veto the legislation. If the President were to veto this legislation, overriding the veto would require a two-thirds majority vote in each chamber. While the House vote last month ended up just short of that number that does not necessarily mean that getting the two-thirds majority needed would be out of the question, as several Republicans in the House who initially declared support for a presidential veto have since expressed wavering support. It is not yet clear what these numbers would look like in the Senate if its version of the bill reaches the floor.
If Congress and the Administration aren’t able to reach agreement before FY 2007 ends on September 30th (which is likely), they will need to pass a continuing resolution to keep funding at FY 2007 levels temporarily until final spending bills are passed. Additionally, while Congressional leaders hope to pass each of the twelve spending bills individually, it is possible that they will need to bundle several appropriations bills into one large omnibus spending bill.
Home Visitation Bill Gains Cosponsors - More Congressional Support Needed
The Education Begins at Home Act (EBAH, H.R. 2343, S. 667) -- legislation that would establish the first dedicated federal funding stream to support parents with newborns and young children through quality, voluntary home visitation -- is picking up steam in the 110th Congress.
Since our update in the June Prevention Advocate, Senators Biden (D-DE) and Salazar (D-CO) have signed onto S. 667 and the following Representatives have signed onto H.R. 2343: Rep. Abercrombie (D-HI-1), Rep. Brady (D-PA-1), Rep. Brown (D-FL-1), Rep. DeLauro (D-CT-3), Rep. Ehlers (R-MI-3), Rep. McCarthy (D-NY-4), Rep. Michaud (D-ME-2), Rep. Sánchez (D-CA-39), and Rep. Souder (R-IN-3). A regularly updated list of EBAH cosponsors for the 110th Congress is available at: http://thomas.loc.gov/. If your member of Congress is listed as a cosponsor please thank him/her for the support.
Take Action Now on the Education Begins at Home Act
Passing federal legislation can be a long, unpredictable process with variables such as public will and political climate impacting the timeline. One of the best ways to demonstrate public will is by compiling a long, bipartisan list of cosponsors. Prevent Child Abuse America has created a sample e-mail asking members of Congress to cosponsor EBAH. We encourage you to personalize the e-mail with local information before sending it on to your Senators and Representatives.
WHAT EBAH WOULD DO
Of the $500 million authorized in EBAH, $400 million would be provided to states on a formula basis to expand and enhance home visiting programs, while the remaining $100 million would be divided between two competitive grants to reach military families and families with English Language Learners. If enacted, EBAH would extend to a broad range of families the opportunity to benefit from home visiting programs like Healthy Families America.
Updates on Additional Prevention Bills
The Shaken Baby Syndrome Prevention Act (S. 1204, H.R. 2052), introduced by Senator Chris Dodd (D-CT) and Representative Nita Lowey (D-NY-18) continues to gain support in Congress. The legislation would provide $10 million to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to develop and implement a public information and education campaign aimed at preventing Shaken Baby Syndrome (SBS).
The campaign created by the SBS Prevention Act would:
- Disseminate effective prevention practices and techniques to parents and caregivers through maternity hospitals, child care centers, organizations providing prenatal and postnatal care, and other organizations providing support to parents.
- Carry out trainings to ensure that those involved in the care of young children, home visitors, primary care providers, child care providers, and health care providers are aware of ways to prevent Shaken Baby Syndrome, and the need to secure immediate medical attention in cases of head trauma.
- Work to ensure that the parents and caregivers of children are connected to effective supports through the coordination of existing programs and networks and through the establishment of new programs when necessary.
You can let your members of Congress know about this important legislation through Prevent Child Abuse America's Legislative Action Center.
The Early Childhood Investment Act of 2007 (S. 1573 and H.R. 2616) introduced by Senator Chris Dodd and Representatives Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-3) and Joe Courtney (D-CT-2) authorizes funding for competitive grants to establish or support existing public-private partnerships that:
- Strengthen the quality of early childhood development opportunities for infants, toddlers, and preschoolers throughout the State;
- Promote school readiness; and
- Increase access to the early childhood development programs.
One partnership per state would be eligible for funding. The partnership would coordinate efforts of nonprofits, businesses, and federal and state governments to better promote healthy child development and school readiness within the state. The bill authorizes $8 billion in the FY 2008, $10 billion in FY 2009, and “such sums as may be necessary” in FY 2010 through 2012. The partnerships would have to provide 50 percent of the overall funding in the first year of the grant, 60 percent of the funding in the second year, and 70 percent of the funding in the remaining three years.
The Safe Babies Act of 2007 (S. 627 and H.R. 1082), introduced by Senators Tom Harkin (D-IA) and Gordon Smith (R-OR) and Representatives Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-3) and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL-18) would authorize funding to create local “Court Teams” comprised of representatives from the legal, child welfare, and children’s services communities to provide integrated support for infants and toddlers who have been maltreated. Funding to local teams would be administered by a National Court Teams Resource Center established by the legislation. The Senate bill authorizes $5 million annually; the House bill does not provide a specific funding level. More information on Court Teams is available at Zero to Three’s website.
The Safe Schools Improvement Act (H.R. 3132) introduced by Representative Linda T. Sánchez (D-CA-39) would amend the Safe and Drug Free Schools and Communities Act to include specific provisions to prevent bullying and harassment. It would require that schools and districts ensure that their codes of conduct specifically prohibit bullying and harassment, and that states include bullying and harassment data in their statewide needs assessments reporting. Current federal law provides federal support to promote school safety but does not comprehensively and expressly focus on issues of bullying or harassment.
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