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Chicago Tribune
4 hours ago
- Health
- Chicago Tribune
Health care providers warn of dire impact of Medicaid cuts
Health care providers warned of dire consequences for patients, including those with commercial insurance, from Medicaid cuts enacted by Congress in what President Donald Trump refers to as his 'big beautiful bill.' Their remarks came from a Medicaid roundtable held Tuesday by U.S. Rep. Frank Mrvan at Porter-Starke Services in Valparaiso. Providers from across Northwest Indiana designated as community mental health centers or federally qualified health centers were represented. 'It's going to be absolutely devastating,' Mrvan said, when the $1 trillion in cuts over the next decade are put into effect. About 211,000 people in the 1st Congressional District are at risk of losing Medicaid coverage, he said. HealthLinc CFO Joan Bondi said the unknown, the undefined, 'really makes it hard to plan. We've been running scenarios. We lose 10% of our population. They just go away.' 'That's very hard to manage a business and very hard to calm our staff,' she said. In gatherings across his district, Mrvan has heard horror stories from people who said their lives will be affected. Providers are still trying to figure out how to cope with the coming funding cuts. 'There are so many things we cannot factor into creating a plan yet,' HealthLinc CEO Melissa Mitchell said. Before attending the meeting Tuesday morning, she had to sign an invoice for an electric bill for one month for one site that reflected a big increase. 'There's no one giving us $4,000 more to take care of people,' she said. Even as the providers expect to suffer from the cuts, so will their patients and staff. 'So many of our patients are one diagnosis away from total decimation of their lives,' Mitchell said. Republicans in Congress said the Medicaid cuts are intended to address 'fraud, waste and abuse.' 'We're one of the most highly regulated industries in the world,' Regional Health Systems CEO Bill Trowbridge said. 'We get regularly audited by each payer, by the state,' Porter-Starke CEO Matt Burden said. 'It sometimes feels as if we were to make a novel and make one typo, someone would say sorry, that's not a novel.' They're looking not at how to help people but how to get people off Medicaid, Trowbridge said. States are increasing the frequency of determining eligibility for Medicaid to twice a year or more. What happens if patients forget to turn in the forms and have to start the eligibility process all over again, wondered Nichole Lessard, Porter-Starke's director of community support services. Losing eligibility puts the patients in limbo because another provision of the legislation removes retroactive coverage for patients. They lose Medicaid, they can't afford health care visits while uninsured, and then they lose their jobs and homes, she fears. Lessing told of a patient who had Medicaid benefits previously. It took from February to July to get them restored. Under the new law, it would then be about time to have to go through the process again. And when the coverage is suspended, chronic conditions worsen. Failing to seek preventative care can lead to emergency room visits and extended hospital stays. 'I do believe emergency rooms will be impacted greatly,' Marram Health Center Vice President Clarence Boykin said. Community HealthNet CEO Janet Seabrook predicts an increase in the number of women not getting mammograms and Pap smears because of the Medicaid funding cuts. Expect increases in cancer rates as screening decreases. 'All of these things are in question when you look at this as a numbers game,' she said. 'Our working, commercially insured people are about to come under the thumb, too,' Mitchell said. Their premiums will go up to cover the cost of treatment for uninsured people. Trowbridge said 17% of his organization's patients are charity cases, receiving treatment for which they are unable to pay. The human toll of the Medicaid cuts is difficult to quantify now, but the anecdotal evidence is already piling up. Mitchell told of a painful conversation with a family member last week. 'He has told me it is cheaper for him to just die than to go get the preventative care he needs,' she said. People who lose their coverage will feel the same. 'It's going to be cheaper for them to just die.' 219 Health Network Executive Director William Cortes told of a patient who went to a wound clinic with a big ulcer on his leg that wasn't healing properly. In this case, it's a nutrition issue. 'People can't afford a good meal,' Cortes said, so this patient would buy five sandwiches for $5 at a fast-food place, eat one and put the rest in the freezer for later consumption. That's an issue with diabetes, where patients have to carefully plan meals. 'If you don't prevent it, then you're at a dialysis center,' Mrvan said. Lessing told of a family in which the father became ill, was diagnosed with cancer, lost his job, lost his insurance and lost his home because he made too much money to qualify for Medicaid. He finally got benefits and was able to reconnect with family, but he then died because he wasn't being treated in time. 'So two boys lost their dad because of a technicality on Medicaid,' she said. It's an example of how lack of access to health care can have terrible consequences for individuals, but it also shows how the workforce could be affected by having workers suffer and lose jobs because of delays in receiving health care. 'I wish there could be more time spent evaluating these realities' before making public policy changes, Trowbridge said.
Chicago Tribune
03-07-2025
- Health
- Chicago Tribune
Northwest Indiana legislators follow party lines in votes on president's tax bill
Northwest Indiana congressmen fell along party lines in supporting or opposing President Donald Trump's bill that funds trillion-dollar tax breaks with spending cuts, largely to Medicaid, as the bill received final Congressional approval Thursday. With the final passage, the bill overcame multiple setbacks to approve Trump's signature second-term policy package before a Fourth of July deadline. The tight House roll call, 218-214, came Thursday at a potentially high political cost, with two Republicans joining all Democrats opposed. GOP leaders worked overnight and the president himself leaned on a handful of skeptics to drop their opposition and send the bill to him to sign into law. Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York delayed voting for more than eight hours by seizing control of the floor with a record-breaking speech against the bill. 'You get tired of winning yet?' said House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., invoking Trump as he called the vote. 'With one big beautiful bill we are going to make this country stronger, safer and more prosperous than ever before,' he said. Republicans celebrated with a rendition of the Village People's 'Y.M.C.A.,' a song the president often plays at his rallies, during a ceremony afterward. U.S. Rep. Frank Mrvan, D-Highland, issued a statement after Thursday's House vote explaining his opposition vote. While the bill may seem 'beautiful' to corporations and the wealthy, for a teacher in East Chicago, a nurse in Gary, the steelworker in Portage or a farmer in LaPorte County, the bill creates 'uncertainty and actually increases the cost of living.' 'I opposed this measure because I cannot in good conscience leave people behind. The Republican Majority made a decision to prioritize their elite donors and corporations, and now seniors, veterans, hard-working Americans, women, children and those yet to be born will pay with increased costs and possibly their lives,' Mrvan said. Mrvan said he will continue to push for 'protecting access to healthcare, feeding the hungry, and creating more opportunities for work and wealth for everyone.' 'It is wrong that the Republican Majority failed to address the legitimate concerns raised by some within their own ranks, and resorted to coercion, bribery with personal gifts and empty promises to meet an artificial deadline,' Mrvan said. The outcome delivers a milestone for the president, by his Friday goal, and for his party. It was a long-shot effort to compile a lengthy list of GOP priorities into what they called his 'one big beautiful bill,' an 800-plus page measure. With Democrats unified in opposition, the bill will become a defining measure of Trump's return to the White House, aided by Republican control of Congress. At its core, the package's priority is $4.5 trillion in tax breaks enacted in 2017 during Trump's first term that would expire if Congress failed to act, along with new ones. This includes allowing workers to deduct tips and overtime pay, and a $6,000 deduction for most older adults earning less than $75,000 a year. There's also a hefty investment, some $350 billion, in national security and Trump's deportation agenda, and to help develop the 'Golden Dome' defensive system over the U.S. To help offset the lost tax revenue, the package includes $1.2 trillion in cutbacks to Medicaid health care and food stamps, largely by imposing new work requirements, including for some parents and older people, and a major rollback of green energy tax credits. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates the package will add $3.3 trillion to the deficit over the decade and 11.8 million more people will go without health coverage. 'This was a generational opportunity to deliver the most comprehensive and consequential set of conservative reforms in modern history, and that's exactly what we're doing,' said Rep. Jodey Arrington, R-Texas, the House Budget Committee chairman. The bill previously passed the Senate on Tuesday. A 50-50 tie was broken by Vice President JD Vance. U.S. Sen. Todd Young said the package includes his legislation that incentivizes R&D activity as well as leveraging private sector investment to increase affordable housing options. 'While I wish this legislation included additional fiscal reforms, this is a strong bill that will benefit Hoosier families and increase the security and prosperity of all Americans,' Young said in a statement. U.S. Sen. Jim Banks, who voted for its passage in the Senate on Tuesday, lauded its increased funding for the Departments of Homeland Security and Defense. 'I'm proud to support the biggest tax cut for working families in American history. This bill delivers on President Trump's promises to secure the border and strengthen our military, while also making the largest spending cut ever.' In many ways, the package is a repudiation of the agendas of the last two Democratic presidents, a chiseling away at the Medicaid expansion from Barack Obama's Affordable Care Act, and a pullback of Joe Biden's climate change strategies in the Inflation Reduction Act. Democrats have described the bill in dire terms, warning that cuts to Medicaid, which some 80 million Americans rely on, would result in lives lost. Food stamps that help feed more than 40 million people would 'rip food from the mouths of hungry children, hungry veterans and hungry seniors,' Jeffries said. Republicans say the tax breaks will prevent a tax hike on households and grow the economy. They maintain they are trying to rightsize the safety net programs for the population they were initially designed to serve, mainly pregnant women, the disabled and children, and root out what they describe as waste, fraud and abuse. The Tax Policy Center, which provides nonpartisan analysis of tax and budget policy, projected the bill would result next year in a $150 tax break for the lowest quintile of Americans, a $1,750 tax cut for the middle quintile and a $10,950 tax cut for the top quintile. That's compared with what they would face if the 2017 tax cuts expired.
Chicago Tribune
02-07-2025
- Climate
- Chicago Tribune
Federal, local officials hold ribbon cutting for Hammond stormwater project
Federal and local officials held a ribbon-cutting ceremony Wednesday to mark the completion of a stormwater improvement project in Hammond's Dowling Park, which replaced undersized drainage infrastructure that led to flooding in 2020. As part of the project, crews constructed a new 60-inch diameter stormwater pipe approximately 1,600 feet in length along the 176th Place corridor, according to an Army Corps of Engineers news release. The project was authorized by Section 219 of the Water Resources Development Act of 1992, which allows the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to provide planning, design and construction assistance for water, wastewater and stormwater infrastructure projects, according to the release. To fund the project, $2.5 million in federal funds were allocated to the project and $825,000 was added by the City of Hammond. The construction contract for nearly $3 million was awarded to Grimmer Construction Inc. of Highland, according to the release. A large rainstorm on May 23, 2020 dumped about four inches of rain in 60 minutes in the Dowling Park neighborhood, said Dean Button, City of Hammond Engineer. The ribbon cutting took place in the flood area, he said. During that flooding, the nearby homes had flooded basements, water stood in the street and water flooded the south side of I-80/I-94 expressway, Button said. 'Where we're standing right now, we would be standing in water. The water completely filled up this entire low-lying area,' Button said. 'Cars were floating down the street. People were taking chances trying to get to their homes and trying to save their valuables, and it was really gut-wrenching to see all that happen here.' To address the flooding, Button said city and federal officials were able to construct an overflow to the pond in the park, which is fed by upstream pump stations, to keep water out of the neighborhood. The overflow of the pond moved through the new stormwater pipe to the pump station on the south side of the expressway into the Little Calumet River, he said. The next phase of the project, Button said, will be to expand the pump station to handle more flow out of water from Hammond. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Commander of the Chicago District Colonel Kenneth Rockwell said the project was more than just concrete and pipe. 'It's about protecting families who have lived too long with the worry of flooding and property damage every time a storm rolls through. It's about ensuring the parks and the neighborhoods that make this city such a great place to live remain safe, accessible and resilient,' Rockwell said. U.S. Rep. Frank Mrvan, D-Highland, was scheduled to be at the event but was called back to Washington D.C., said Mrvan's senior advisor Mark Lopez, who read a prepared statement from Mrvan. The project was an investment in 'our community's infrastructure, safety and sustainability,' Lopez said. 'Stormwater may not always be top of mind, but the systems that manage it are essential to protecting our homes, our environment and our quality of life,' Lopez said. 'This project is a testament to what can be accomplished when vision, planning and partnership come together.'
Chicago Tribune
26-06-2025
- Politics
- Chicago Tribune
Hammond woman receives Carnegie hero award for assisting swimmers in peril
About two years ago, Sara Schaller and her daughter were at Porter Beach, collecting seashells and building sandcastles. As they were ready to leave, a woman ran up to them, asking if Schaller knew how to swim. 'She was like, 'She's drowning,'' Schaller said. 'I was like, 'What?' And then she pointed out to the water, and I could see someone going in and out of the surface.' A teenage girl and a teenage boy were trapped in Lake Michigan, Schaller said, but at the time, she only saw the girl. Schaller asked the woman to watch her child as she went to save the girl. 'She got pulled out past the buoys,' Schaller said. 'I just kept trying to talk to her, telling her she's got to swim, she's got to help me.' Tides had been bad at the beach that week, Schaller said, and the teenagers got swept up in a current while swimming. Schaller eventually brought the girl to shore when she learned a boy was also in the water. She swam to pull him out of the water and administered CPR until paramedics arrived. The next day, Schaller received a call from a detective on the scene, saying the girl survived, but the boy didn't. 'She said they were out swimming, and the tide took them out,' Schaller said. 'There was no way she was going to make it on her own.' In April, Schaller received a medal from the Carnegie Hero Fund Commission, which is an organization that recognizes civilians in the U.S. and Canada for acts of heroism, according to its website. U.S. Rep. Frank Mrvan, D-Highland, presented Schaller with the Carnegie medal. Schaller doesn't know who nominated her for the award, but she said it had to be someone who was at the incident. She hasn't talked to the girl she rescued or her family since the drowning. The Hammond resident was surprised to receive the award, she said. 'I'd never heard of the Carnegie award prior to this experience,' Schaller added. 'I was just happy that I was able to get the girl out in time. I feel really bad I didn't get the boy, though. That still bothers me.' Mrvan also talked about Schaller on the House of Representatives floor earlier this month. 'Northwest Indiana is home to over 40 miles of incredible shoreline on Lake Michigan, which is a tremendous attraction for tourism and our economy,' Mrvan said. 'But also, unfortunately, can, at times, pose great dangers with its currents and riptides. … Where many hesitated, (Schaller) stepped up and took life-saving action.' According to the Great Lakes Surf Rescue Project, since 2010, the Great Lakes have seen 1,357 drownings. In 2025, the lakes have already seen 23 drownings. The week Schaller saved the girl from drowning, most Indiana beaches had a tide advisory, and there were drownings in other areas. 'There was a general warning out that there was a strong tide,' Schaller said. 'The waves were big, and the water was pretty strong.' The Great Lakes Surf Rescue Project is a nonprofit that raises awareness about water safety, said Dave Benjamin, its co-founder and executive director. 'Knowing how to swim doesn't mean you could survive the marathon of a drowning incident, unless you have a survival strategy set in place,' Benjamin said. In 2010, Benjamin himself nearly drowned while surfing on Lake Michigan in Portage. He wiped out near a rock wall near a pier, and he didn't stay attached to his surfboard. 'When you panic, all of your experience, it's pretty much out the window,' Benjamin said. 'You start making a lot of mistakes.' It's important to know drowning statistics, Benjamin said, including who, when, where and why. He encourages adults to keep an eye on children when they're near bodies of water. In May, the Indiana Department of Natural Resources released water safety tips to Hoosiers, including discussing the dangers of water; telling someone where you are going and when you'll return; going with a buddy; staying away from flooded or fast-moving waterways; wearing a life jacket; keeping a watchful eye on children; and avoiding alcohol. When boating, the DNR recommends assessing water levels and monitoring the boat's speed, as well as designating a sober boat operator. People should also wear life jackets, which should be U.S. Coast Guard-approved, in good working condition, and an appropriate size for the wearer, according to the DNR. Benjamin also encourages people to pay attention to currents and tide trends each day because that impacts swimming conditions.
Chicago Tribune
13-06-2025
- Business
- Chicago Tribune
BP postpones carbon pipeline project indefinitely
As a Whiting resident, Lisa Vallee is happy to no longer worry about BP's proposed carbon sequestration project. 'It seems, on the surface, like it's such a great idea,' said Vallee, who is also the organizing director for Just Transition Northwest Indiana. 'But it's been proven globally that these projects don't actually reduce carbon emissions, and then they're much more dangerous than they are worth.' BP has indefinitely paused its carbon sequestration project, which would have required a pipeline to run through hundreds of miles in six Indiana counties to store carbon emissions underground. 'BP is committed to remaining a critical driver of the economic engine that powers Northwest Indiana and the Midwest,' a company spokesperson said in a statement. 'While we are indefinitely pausing our low-carbon project in the region, our focus is on building a strong, economically competitive future for our Whiting Refinery.' The company said 'many factors' went into the decision, including uncertainty created by current economic conditions; focus on the company's core businesses; a slow-developing hydrogen market in the Midwest; lack of an identified carbon storage facility; and lack of certainty for long-term federal support for low carbon hydrogen. The decision only relates to BP's involvement in the Midwest Alliance for Clean Hydrogen hub and no other low-carbon project the company might develop nationally or globally, according to the spokesperson. U.S. Rep. Frank Mrvan, D-Highland, said in a statement that 'it's not lost' on him that the company made the decision during House passage of legislation that would end the clean hydrogen production tax credit. The decision makes it clear that the Trump Administration's actions cause a 'real and devastating impact' on workers and manufacturing nationwide, Mrvan said. 'I will continue to actively seek opportunities to collaborate in a bipartisan manner, with all levels of government, and with organized labor and all stakeholders to reverse this trend and create new opportunities for transformational economic growth, work, and wealth in Northwest Indiana,' Mrvan said. The Biden Administration allocated up to $1 billion in funding for the planned hub, but shifting priorities have led the Department of Energy to reevaluate the awards for the Midwest hub and three others in the Pacific Northwest, California and the Mid-Atlantic, according to Reuters. Just Transition Northwest Indiana learned the project was paused following a statement from the Benton County Board of Commissioners. Benton County was one of the Indiana counties that would've been affected by the project. 'We have been advised that in February BP indefinitely suspended all carbon sequestration and hydrogen gas exploration,' said the letter from Benton County commissioners. 'They're focusing back on their roots of oil exploration. They felt this is not the time or place with the feedback they received from Benton County.' Vallee was surprised to learn about the project's pause from Benton County and not BP. Just Transition Northwest Indiana members knew there was a possibility that it would be paused because tax credits might be taken away by the federal government, Vallee said. 'This pipeline was supposed to be part of the Midwest Alliance for Clean Hydrogen hub, and that has not gone away, at least yet,' Vallee said. 'So, we are accepting this victory and very excited, but also aware that there are a lot of other sneaky false solutions that are probably right around the corner.' Gary Advocates for Responsible Development was relieved to see BP put the pipeline project on pause, board member Carolyn McCrady said in a statement Thursday. 'However, pause does not mean gone, and we will remain vigilant about any future attempts to reinstate a pipeline,' McCrady said. 'And (we) will continue to insist that they initiate advanced and available technologies to reduce their heavily polluting tar sands emissions.'
