LANSING – After two tries, the Michigan Senate was able to pass legislation that would expand Medicaid coverage to some 470,000 people, but it could not garner the votes necessary for immediate effect, and there is no certainty on how or when it will do so going forward, a Senate spokesperson said on Wednesday.

“We haven’t decided what we’re going to do with regard to immediate effect (on HB 4714 ),” said Amber McCann, spokesperson for Senate Majority Leader Randy Richardville (R-Monroe). “The focus last night was moving forward on the bill and anything after that becomes a technical and procedural answer, but right now we accomplished what we set out to accomplish, which was to move 4714 out of the chamber.”

Technically, the actual bill is still in possession of the Senate, according to Jeff Cobb, spokesperson for Senate Majority Floor Leader Arlan Meekhof (R-West Olive). Since the Senate made changes to the bill, it would have to decide to give immediate effect before sending it to the House for concurrence. The Senate would have to make a new motion to give immediate effect to HB 4714, but Cobb agreed with Ms. McCann on the uncertainty regarding bringing immediate effect up again.

The chamber was two votes shy of achieving immediate effect on Tuesday night. The final tally was 24-14, with all 14 opposed being Republican senators. Twenty-six votes were needed to achieve the required two-thirds majority.

Voting no on immediate effect were Sen. Darwin Booher of Evart, Sen. Jack Brandenburg of Harrison Township, Sen. Bruce Caswell of Hillsdale, Sen. Patrick Colbeck of Canton Township, Sen. Judy Emmons of Sheridan, Sen. Mike Green of Mayville, Sen. Joe Hune of Hamburg, Sen. Rick Jones of Grand Ledge, Sen. John Moolenaar of Midland, Sen. Mike Nofs of Battle Creek, Sen. Phil Pavlov of St. Clair, Sen. John Proos of St. Joseph, Sen. Dave Robertson of Grand Blanc and Sen. Tonya Schuitmaker of Lawton.

The opposition is an interesting aspect of the situation, given that this term Senate Republicans have made voting for immediate effect a so-called procedural vote where the caucus must stick together (especially since they have the super majority to do so) even if they disagree with the policy.

If the chamber does nothing, the bill cannot go into effect until the expiration of 90 days following the sine die adjournment of the Legislature. That would likely put the effective date in late March. There is the option of adjourning sine die early, but McCann said that is unlikely to happen. The Legislature could only then return if Governor Rick Snyder called a special session where he would set the agenda.

“We still intend to have a full fall agenda,” McCann said. “We’re going to proceed with our plans with some member priorities.”

Ari Adler, spokesperson for House Speaker Jase Bolger (R-Marshall), agreed on the sine die issue for the House, saying in an email, “We have way too much work yet to do for Michigan’s taxpayers.”

Senate Democrats, in a statement on Tuesday night, blasted Senate Republicans for failing to provide immediate effect. Without immediate effect, the bill cannot go into effect in time to meet the January 1, 2014, federal deadline for implementing Medicaid expansion under the federal Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, they said.

Community Health Director James Haveman said Tuesday that the state will lose $7 million in federal funds a day without having immediate effect for the bill.

“By failing to enact immediate effect, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have rendered all progress made in passing this legislation useless,” said Senate Minority Leader Gretchen Whitmer (D-East Lansing). “I urge my Republican colleagues to return to session and vote this important legislation through with immediate effect in order to make its passing valid and its implementation possible.”

But Booher, a member of the Senate workgroup that revised HB 4714 but who voted against the bill’s passage and its immediate effect, said he thought the “cooling off period” the Senate had by not having session until next week could change things.

“I do believe we vote for IE, but it was all part of the emotions (last night),” he said. “Everybody’s all geared up and emotions were running high, so I think people will see things a little differently and things will get done in normal order next week.”

McCann said there were no caucus discussions regarding voting for immediate effect on HB 4714, and Brandenburg said he thinks the deviation by more than half of the Republican caucus on last night’s immediate effect vote was the first of its kind the two-and-a-half years the chamber has spent together.

“This was such a controversial issue … I believe that this was bigger than right-to-work, because this was a massive expansion of government,” he said. “When it comes to immediate effect, due to the controversy around this legislation, I didn’t feel I or anyone else voting no should take any ownership whatsoever.”

Otherwise, he said, he expects nothing will change when it comes to a procedural ‘yes’ vote for immediate effect on other legislation going forward.

Green said making immediate effect a procedural vote that everyone had to support during the term was a decision by Richardville, but regardless of what happens going forward, he thought Richardville did the right thing by not trying to reconsider immediate effect for HB 4714 on Tuesday night.

“It would have been difficult to twist arms to get immediate effect,” he said.

This story was provided by Gongwer News Service. To subscribe, click on Gongwer.Com