It is incorrect for legislators to claim that the final Medicaid swap will allow counties to pay for schools and other infrastructure needs. It does, indeed, provide more money to some counties, but the larger and faster growing counties — you know, the ones that need to spend money on new schools — do barely more than break even with the state hold harmless money. Fiscally, there’s no big difference between the before and after pictures for counties.
We examined this likelihood in December and February. The tax hike may be smaller, but the mechanism is the same and taxpayers as usual are collateral damage.
