By JIM TALAMONTI
Illinois Radio Network
SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (IRN) — Members of the Illinois General Assembly’s Joint Committee on Administrative Rules are not happy they’ve been given the task of ending the state’s Health Benefits for Immigrant Adults program.
HBIA currently serves eligible individuals aged 42 to 64. The program is scheduled to end on July 1, 2025. The last day of medical coverage through HBIA will be June 30.
Governor J.B. Pritzker did not include funding for HBIA in this year’s budget proposal. Combined HBIA and Health Benefits for Immigrant Seniors spending in fiscal year 2024 was $682 million. Since inception, the total HBIS and HBIA program has cost Illinois taxpayers more than $1.6 billion.
State Rep. Curtis Tarver, D-Chicago, questioned members of the Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services why JCAR was handed new emergency rules to end HBIA.
“I want you to go back to there being a victory lap by the administration about helping these individuals and simultaneously filing emergency rules to kill the program. And then here we are with JCAR with the responsibility of killing the program,” Tarver said.
Omar Shaker is the Department of Healthcare and Family Services’ chief of administrative rules.
“The governor presented a budget in February of this year that did not have any money allocated for the program and that’s when we began to initiate the process of creating these administrative rules to respond to that if that is the eventuality,” Shaker said.
Shaker confirmed to Tarver that money had been allocated for the program the last several years.
State Rep. Steven Reick, R-Woodstock, said he questioned why emergency rulemaking authority was given when the HBIA bill was first considered in the statehouse.
“I believe this is an emergency of the administration’s own making. It is not an emergency per se,” Reick said.
Reick said the administration abused emergency rulemaking authority and took a “meat axe” approach to cutting HBIA.
“It’s an abuse of JCAR to use us as the vehicle by which this program is terminated,” Reick said.
Tarver said it would be important to advise immigrants who would be no longer be receiving benefits.
“It’s very concerning to me. I would like to certainly have a conversation offline as well about specific outreach, so that those individuals are aware and they can get the resources they need. I don’t think any of this is their fault. Whether it’s the administration, I don’t think it’s JCAR for sure, or the legislature, it’s certainly not their fault,” Tarver said.
Greg Bishop contributed to this story.
