Rep. Matt Hudson will be in charge of health care spending in the House of Representatives and the substantive Health and Human Services Committee will be run by Rep. Jason Brodeur.
House Speaker Steve Crisafulli released the committee assignments on December 1. In an email to members Crisafulli said he is sure that the committee chairmen will, “truly put Floridians first.”
“I have every confidence these committee and appropriations subcommittee chairs will do a great job steering policy and budgetary matters through the House, and I look forward to beginning our work next month during the January committee weeks,” the speaker said in the brief announcement.
Hudson was first elected in a special election in 2007 and has been re-elected subsequently. He is also Speaker Pro Tempore.
Hudson said he was ‘thrilled” that the speaker had confidence in him to serve in two leadership roles. This will be Hudson’s third term where he will chair the committee in the House.
“This will be my fifth year doing the job,” Hudson said, laughing. “I think I know the job pretty well.”
Hudson said his priorities in the upcoming session will be veterans, people with disabilities, seniors and children. While he said it was too early to make predictions on whether there will be reductions in Medicaid and health care spending he did acknowledge that “there are always opportunities to make sure government runs more efficiently.”
Meanwhile, Brodeur,was at odds with the managed care and insurance industry last year when he pushed legislation supported by the Florida Medical Association that would have, among other things, required Medicaid managed care providers as well as commercial insurers and HMOs to provide access to override “step therapy” protocols for pharmaceuticals.
Additionally, the bill also would have required managed care companies and insurers to have a link on their homepage with the list of preferred providers in the network. The companies would have been required to update any changes to the provider list within 24 hours.
Tim Stapleton said the issues continue to be a top priority for the FMA in 2015.
Brodeur did not immediately return phone calls or respond to an email seeking comment.
There are three subcommittees under Brodeur’s full committee: Health Innovation, Health Quality and Children, Families & Seniors.
Crisafulli did not name the members of the committees nor did he name the chairs or the members of the subcommittees. Crisafulli’s Communications Director, Michael Williams, said those announcements would “be coming soon.”
