By David Farmer,Staff Writer

AUGUSTA – The goal of making companies accountable for the health insurance they offer – or don’t offer – their employees underwent a metamorphosis Wednesday, transforming into a new government study.

L.D. 1927, written by Senate President Beth Edmonds, would have required the state to collect data regarding workers at large companies who receive MaineCare benefits. The monthly reports would have included the types of jobs and workers, wages they receive and whether they work full- or part-time. The information would have been sorted by industry and would have been compiled only from companies with 1,000 or more employees.

On Wednesday, the bill was recast, rewritten and renamed.

Instead of collecting information specifically about workers who receive MaineCare, the bill calls for a one-time Department of Labor survey to collect information on the status of employer-based health insurance in Maine.

With the controversial elements stripped from the bill, it passed the committee unanimously.

“I don’t think it’s that different,” said Hannah Pingree, D-North Haven and House chairwoman of the Health and Human Services Committee. “It ends up accomplishing the same kind of goal,” which was to collect information about how people in the state receive their health insurance.

It’s a precursor, Pingree said, to more significant legislation, which she says she expects to see next year, that will look at the employer-based health insurance system.

The original title of Edmonds’ proposal, An Act to Prevent State Taxpayers from Subsidizing Large Employers, was changed to Resolve, to Collect Information about Employer-Based Health Insurance.

“That’s a start,” Edmonds said. “It will be good to get the information from this report, but it doesn’t get to the question that you all raised in your report for the Sun Journal.”

Edmonds credited a November investigation by the Sun Journal for drawing attention to the number of people who work but still find themselves receiving state welfare benefits, including MaineCare.

“We’ll try again,” Edmonds said.

If passed by the House and Senate and signed by the governor, the report from the Department of Labor is due early next year. It’s expected to cost $65,000 to conduct the research.