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Purchasing pool plan put on hold

JEFFERSON CITY - A bill to create a health insurance purchasing pool for small businesses stumbled Tuesday in the House Budget Committee, which voted 17-16 to keep it from returning to the House floor.

The bill, which would extend an insurance option to small businesses under the plan state and local government employees may use, has already received first-round House approval.

"I'm a little concerned that it's becoming a partisan issue," said bill sponsor Rep. Tim Harlan, D-Columbia.

Harlan said the state will recover the estimated $140,350 the bill will add to the state budget through the price of premiums.

Rep. James Foley, D-St. Ann, a co-sponsor, expects to see the bill up for another committee vote later in the week and said he believes it will pass. At least two supporters, he said, were absent from Tuesday's vote.

"The insurance industry is hitting it hard to defeat the bill," Foley said. "They know rates will go down, and they don't want the competition."

But Foley anticipates a close vote either way. "There are a lot of mechanisms to defeat a bill. They're easier to defeat than pass."