Â鶹ŮÓÅ

Federal judge has rescheduled a court hearing as attorneys for an Ohio group and the state work to settle a lawsuit involving people terminated from the Medicaid health care program. Judge Algenon Marbley said in an order on Wednesday that the parties have told the court they have agreed to settlement terms but need more time to finalize a decision. (5/7)

The federal government is urging the U.S. Supreme Court to reject Republican Gov. Paul LePage's request to decide whether Maine can eliminate Medicaid coverage for thousands of low-income young adults. LePage's administration asked the court to review the case in February after a federal appeals court denied its plan to remove about 6,000 19-and-20-year-olds from Maine's Medicaid program. (Durkin, 5/6)

Missouri’s Gov. Jay Nixon has until Friday to decide whether to allow an expansion of Medicaid managed care to become law. Advocates are urging him to reject the measure. The expansion would shift 200,000 parents and children from traditional Medicaid, the government-funded insurance for low-income residents, to private managed care plans. It was included in the Legislature’s budget proposal for the state fiscal year that begins July 1. (Shapiro, 5/6)

The decision settles one part of the budget battle between Hogan and the Democratic-controlled legislature, which balked when the governor introduced a budget in January that eliminated the pay raises for state workers, reduced proposed funding levels for 13 of the state’s largest school systems where the cost of education is more expensive and reduced spending for several health-care initiatives. ... Hogan still must decide whether to spend the $133 million that the General Assembly set aside to fully fund high-cost school systems and to pay for some Medicaid-related programs that the governor cut. (Wiggins, 5/6)