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A bill that could have helped shore up the state's Medicaid program got caught in a fight over road funding Tuesday and suffered a mortal blow. The Senate adjourned Tuesday evening a few hours after a committee failed to vote on the bill. The committee's lack of action meant the bill cannot pass in the current session. The legislation, which would split an estimated $639 million payment over the 2010 oil spill, passed the House Thursday and needed to pass a Senate committee to stay alive. The bill would have split the proceeds between state debt payment and coastal road projects, and freed up money for Medicaid. (Lyman, 5/3)

The disagreement between competing versions of the bill concerned how much money should go to repaying state debts and how much should go to road projects in Mobile and Baldwin counties, the coastal counties on the front lines of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster. Both versions would have made available $70 million for the Alabama Medicaid Agency next year, which would erase most of what the agency says is an $85 million shortfall. (Cason, 5/3)

Seeking to slash the red tape that keeps ex-prisoners with mental illness, drug addiction and other ailments from getting health coverage, Maryland is proposing to give thousands of newly released inmates temporary Medicaid membership with few questions asked. The measure, described as the first of its kind in the nation, would help close a gap occurring when sick inmates leave jail or prison care but have trouble getting coverage and treatment after they get out, sometimes for months, advocates say. (Hancock, 5/4)

The Obama administration has announced efforts to make sure inmates have Medicaid coverage when they are released, including those in halfway houses. ... But it will have little effect on ex-inmates in Idaho. Because Idaho lawmakers have not expanded Medicaid eligibility to low-income adults without dependent children, most former inmates in Idaho likely would fall into the “Medicaid gap,” a spokeswoman for the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare told the Statesman. (Dutton, 5/3)

An eligibility assessment tool in use since 2013 has resulted in arbitrary reductions and terminations of home-based Medicaid services for the elderly and disabled, a federal lawsuit contends. The lawsuit against the Arkansas Department of Human Services was filed late Monday by Jonesboro-based Legal Aid of Arkansas on behalf of Bradley Ledgerwood, 34, of Cash, who has cerebral palsy, and Ethel Jacobs, 90, of Helena-West Helena, who has Alzheimer's disease. (Davis, 5/4)

Non-profit health-care clinics like Planned Parenthood would be limited in how much they can bill the federal government for medications provided to Medicaid recipients, if an amendment to the state budget wins approval. Currently, these non-profits purchase certain prescription drugs at a discount. Some facilities have been accused of giving discounted prescriptions to Medicaid patients and billing Medicaid providers for the full price of the medication. (Beard Rau, 5/3)