Whether eligibility restrictions will be added to the blind medical subsidy fund will next be considered by House and Senate conferees.

Representative Ryan Silvey (photo courtesy, Missouri House Communications)

The legislature’s budget proposal added such restrictions to that fund in the budget, which some lawmakers and the Governor say is meaningless without accompanying language in statute.

House Budget Chairman Ryan Silvey (R-Kansas City) offered that language as an amendment to a Senate bill dealing with home health care issues.

“We had taken in (the budget) the requirements of the SCHIP program and applied them to the blind healthcare program. Again, House Bill 2011 got signatures of every member of the conference committee, republican, democrat, House and Senate, and we passed the bill out of both chambers.”

See Silvey’s amendment offered to SB 854

The Senate refused to accept the House’s version of the bill and sent it back. The House has requested a conference to settle the chambers’ differences.

See our earlier stories on the blind pension fund in the state budget.

The House representatives on that conference committee are Representatives Silvey, Thomas Long (R-Battlefield), Jay Barnes (R-Jefferson City), Rory Ellinger (D-University City) and Judy Morgan (D-Kansas City).