AUGUSTA – Two weeks after more than 1,000 people – many disabled and in wheelchairs – turned out to protest cuts in services, Gov. John Baldacci said he’s partially restoring some of those services.

But now the state has a new $8.4 million hole in a budget, the governor said, adding that that money has to be made up somewhere.

Earlier this month Baldacci proposed eliminating a list of 15 medical services to help erase a $160 million budget deficit, much of it from MaineCare programs. MaineCare services on the list were: pediatric, dental, brain injury, occupational, physical, speech and hearing therapy, audiology, eye care, psychological services, prosthetics, hearing aids and social worker services.

On Tuesday the governor said “for the most part those 15 services will be maintained,” but there will be limits on how often people can receive services. “So this is a change,” Baldacci said.

The softening of the cuts “helps show we’re listening” to what people said at the March 15 hearing, the governor said during an interview Tuesday. It’s important, he said, to protect the most vulnerable.

“But things have got to change,” Baldacci said, adding the status quo cannot continue. “I’m looking at a $930 million two-year shortfall” for the budget that lawmakers will wrangle with in January, Baldacci warned.

The administration is using several methods to reduce but not eliminate services, including paying some providers less and looking at cuts suggested by providers. A group of optometrists had ideas, “so we’re running numbers on services they think are the less needed,” said Trish Riley, director of the Governor’s Office on Health Care Policy and Finance.

The administration also saved by creating three levels of services: emergency, less acute and maintenance or day rehab. Priority was given to services that saved people’s lives, while services that help restore function came as secondary “in this kind of budget situation,” Riley said. That means maintenance services will not be eliminated, but will be fewer.

While the revised cuts are a work in progress, one of the biggest restoration areas is services to the brain injured. Two weeks ago $9 million in those services were being eliminated. Now the cut is only $1.4 million, Riley said. The cuts were restored by creating different levels of care “so everybody doesn’t get the same high level of care,” she said.

Podiatry, which is important for diabetes patients, has been completely restored.

At the other end of the scale is occupational, physical, speech and hearing therapy. They are still up for elimination unless ways can be found to save. “I don’t know what the answer is,” Riley said. The administration had proposed limiting therapy to 12, one-hour visits a year as some other states do. “We looked at other states, 19 states don’t provide physical therapy at all, 24 don’t provide occupational therapy.” So far there’s no agreement with providers, Riley said.

Lawmakers generally said they approved of the administration’s efforts to soften cuts. “It’s the right direction,” said Senate Majority Leader Sharon Treat, D-Farmingdale.

A cap on health services is acceptable as long as exceptions are made, said Appropriations Committee co-chair Sen. Mary Cathcart, D-Orono.

Republicans favor some of the restorations Baldacci has made, “but the governor may not have gone far enough,” said House Minority Leader Joseph Bruno, R-Raymond. Republicans don’t favor making cuts for the sake of cutting, he said. Cuts should provide an economic payback. Some of the governor’s cuts are still so deep “it may not be worth having the program anymore,” Bruno said.

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