Cuts to the Health Quality and Cost Council

By Jim Stergios
October 22nd, 2008

There is still money in the budget for the Commonwealth Corps, for, ahem, a start on universal pre-K, and many of the Governor’s other pet projects. He slashes deep into health and human services budget, but keeps alive expansions–I repeat, expansion–in other pet programs. Then, today, he announced the short-sighted action to cut 37 percent of the budget for the state council that, in accordance with the 2006 health care reform act, is meant to improve the quality and contain cost of health care in Massachusetts. The staff is gone.

As noted in our recent policy brief, there is no strategy to the Governor’s cuts. As the administration advances universal pre-K even as it cuts other pre-K programs, as it lards up the education budget with a Secretary while cutting METCO, assistance for MCAS, and other programs, we can without any lingering doubt assert that there is no strategy to the cuts.

We need a Governor who can prioritize.