After a bloody public battle, New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer (D) and the Healthcare Association of New York may have reached a compromise on the state's healthcare budget. Spitzer had proposed cuts which would slice $1.3 billion from New York's healthcare spending, sparking a firestorm of protests from the state's hospitals and nursing homes. The compromise deal, which would add about $300 million to Spitzer's proposed budget, would give hospitals 75 percent of the 2.5 percent cost-of-living increase they had expected. Spitzer has also agreed in principle to let the state's gross receipt tax on hospitals expire at the end of this month. The deal doesn't please everyone--downstate hospitals with the Greater New York Hospital Association say it they'll lose $110 million if it replaces a more generous proposal by Assembly Democrats--but it seems to work for many of the state's facilities, observers say.
To learn more about the deal:
- read this Albany Times Union article