What you're not hearing in the people's veto campaign

While we scrambled to meet income tax deadlines last April 15, Maine politicians passed $70 million in tax increases on health care and beverages to pump more tax dollars into Dirigo Health. In response, the state Chamber of Commerce, the beverage industry and other businesses united as the Fed Up With Taxes coalition to put a people's veto question on the November ballot, hoping voters will reject the new taxes.

Dirigo was supposed to be the closest thing to universal health care that Maine, and the nation, had ever seen.  Today, Dirigo is nationally recognized as a colossal failure.  Hopefully, the old saying "As Maine goes, so goes the nation" won't apply this time.

Dirigo was passed in 2003, with bipartisan support, based on promises by Gov. Baldacci and his Augusta bureaucrats.  Politicians and the public were assured the taxpayer-funded government healthcare program would cover all 128,000 uninsured Mainers by 2009. Baldacci and his cronies also promised that Dirigo would pay for itself through the healthcare savings it would create and would NEVER require tax increases for funding. Today, just five years later, both promises have been broken.

As we approach the 2009 benchmark, just 11,500 Mainers are covered by Dirigo, fewer than the 128,000 goal, and down from a high of 15,000 enrolled last September.  Of those 11,500, only about 3,900 were previously uninsured, and, for over a year now, Dirigo has been closed to new enrollees. Not exactly the progress we were promised, huh?

At a cost to taxpayers of $3,040 per enrollee annually for coverage and overhead, Dirigo is a massive burden that cannot meet its goal of universal coverage. The new $70 million tax increase that broke the no-new-taxes promise was passed not to expand coverage, but to fund benefits for those last few thousand still enrolled. Even if the people's veto campaign fails, Dirigo enrollment is still expected to decline by another 1,000. 

The Fed Up With Taxes coalition rightfully notes that Maine's tax burden is already too high, especially with a struggling economy and rising energy costs. The new Dirigo tax only increases that burden.  In the age of the five second sound bite, however, their people's veto campaign won't have many opportunities to discuss the program's failures.

Whether or not voters reject the tax increase, it's time politicians recognize that Dirigo isn't working. The solution to covering Maine's uninsured is not another tax increase to fund a failing government program. Expanding the number of private health insurance options will empower Mainers to find affordable healthcare coverage, and will reduce the burden Dirigo has heaped onto taxpayers.

Enabling and empowering Mainers to purchase health insurance plans available in other states will quickly and significantly reduce the rate of uninsured. Today, there is essentially just one private insurance option available for Maine individuals and only three available for small businesses. With so few options available, is it surprising that Mainers can't find an affordable plan?

Residents in other states are paying much less than Mainers for an identical private health insurance plan.  In Connecticut, for example, a 25-year-old can find an individual health insurance plan for just $162 a month with no deductible. That same individual would pay $700 each month with a $1,000 deductible for the very same plan in Maine with our high cost regulations. No wonder Maine's uninsured rate for young adults is so high.

Real progress in covering Maine's uninsured will come when politicians eliminate the gimmicks and red tape keeping private health insurance companies from offering their plans in Maine. Raising taxes to fund a failing government-run healthcare program is taking us backward in the goal of covering the uninsured. 

Politicians' obsession with Dirigo has essentially shut down conversation about real healthcare reform. As part of the annual scramble to revive the failing program, too many politicians are unwilling to entertain proposals like the one mentioned above. Had Dirigo been passed along with new private insurance options, more Mainers would be insured today.

I support the efforts of the Fed Up With Taxes coalition, and even signed their petition to eliminate the $70 million tax increase, to send a clear message to politicians that taxes are too high, and because progress in covering Maine's uninsured requires politicians to accept that Dirigo has failed. Entertaining other health care reforms, like expanding private health insurance options in Maine, will create a responsible solution to our healthcare challenges, and that is what we need to focus on.  

Chris Cinquemani is the communications director of Maine Leads, an Augusta-based non-profit working for lower taxes and government transparency in Maine. Chris previously served as field coordinator and communications director for the 2006 Taxpayer Bill of Rights Campaign, communications director for the Maine Senate Republican Office, and state director of the 2007 No More Than 4 Campaign to oppose extending term limits for state legislators.