Over 100 House Republicans call for health center funding

More than 100 House Republicans are calling on Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) to quickly reauthorize a pot of money crucial to community health centers, which service millions of the nation’s most vulnerable.

In a letter sent Friday, 105 Republicans, led by Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.), expressed their concern over the fact that long-term funding for community health centers lapsed Sept. 30 — and urged its reauthorization in the “next moving piece of legislation to be signed into law.”

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Lawmakers are racing to pass another short-term spending bill this week. Community health center advocates are anxiously awaiting word on whether it will include a reauthorization of federal funding for the centers.

“We know you are a strong supporter of community health centers,” the lawmakers wrote to Ryan, “and we share your concern about the disruptions they are currently facing as a result of going over the so-called ‘funding cliff’ at the end of September 2017.”

At the GOP policy retreat Friday, House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Greg Walden (R-Ore.) told The Hill that GOP leaders are looking to attach two years of funding for community health centers to a short-term spending bill needed to keep the government’s lights on past Feb. 8.

But, Walden cautioned that details are still being ironed out. Rank-and-file House Republicans are expected to hear a pitch from GOP leaders Monday night on the stopgap spending bill to avoid a government shutdown.

On Sept. 30, a fund comprising 70 percent of federal dollars for community health centers expired. Health centers typically have garnered bipartisan support, and the fund was created as a noncontroversial part of the Affordable Care Act. It was reauthorized in 2015 for a total of $7.2 billion over two years.

Before lawmakers left Washington, D.C., for the holidays, they passed a short-term spending bill that included $550 million for these centers through March 31.

But the uncertainty over when permanent funding will come has had an impact.

About 20 percent of centers have instituted hiring freezes, a quarter have cancelled or delayed a renovation or expansion project and 4 percent have laid off staff, according to a Kaiser Family Foundation report released Thursday.