LEWISTON — As local agencies that aid the young, the elderly, the poor and the sick braced themselves Wednesday against deep cuts in state funding, they also issued a warning.

Cut their funding and suffer higher costs later.

“These are Draconian cuts,” said Catherine Ryder, executive director of Tri-County Mental Health Services. The cuts would affect 65,000 Maine people.

The people her agency helps — people with mental illnesses — will still need help, she said.

“Where would those folks go?” Ryder said.

The LePage administration on Thursday issued its plan to offset a $120 million shortfall in state funding.

The proposal would restructure the MaineCare system and slash state reimbursement for health care for childless adults and lower reimbursement for independent providers of elderly and mental health care.

At Central Maine Medical Center in Lewiston, the cuts might mean fewer patients in doctors’ offices but increased numbers in the more costly emergency room, said Chuck Gill, the hospital’s vice president for public affairs.

“Overall, we’d be deeply troubled and concerned about any cuts to MaineCare,” Gill said. “Somewhere along the way, the cost of that change will be transferred out to the rest of the population, kind of reallocating the cost of MaineCare to everyone.”

That’s not the hospital’s only worry: CMMC already is owed $52 million by MaineCare, Gill said.

“We understand that there is a major problem in the state of Maine with the budget, but we’re concerned about the approach being taken,” he said.

The Lewiston hospital and its larger organization, Central Maine HealthCare, plan to contact every legislator in the area. 

“We go as far west as Fryeburg and as far east as Brunswick,” Gill said. “We’ll be talking to all the elected officials that represent our people, because this impacts the people they represent.” 

Other groups were waiting for the specifics of the LePage plan before saying much. 

“There is a lot here; it will take us some time to evaluate the full impact and plan accordingly,” St. Mary’s Regional Medical Center officials said in a prepared statement.

Estelle Rubinstein, executive director of Androscoggin Head Start and Child Care, plans to attend a meeting Thursday of her counterparts throughout the state to examine the proposal and what it might mean.

“We know this could be very devastating,” Rubinstein said. 

Paul Gosselin, executive director of Lewiston-based United Ambulance, said he, too, was waiting for the details.

“We’re still trying to assess the impact of it,” he said. However, he worries that without MaineCare, the amount of bad debt he faces would rise.

“Part of the group that may lose coverage will still need an ambulance and will still get service,” Gosselin said. “Obviously, payment has to come from somebody.”

At Tri-County Mental Health, the cuts could force people with mental illnesses out of group homes and into costlier hospital settings, Ryder said. She also worries that the administration’s cuts would hamper the agency’s ability to help people who are suicidal or potentially violent.

“I can’t quite wrap my head around it,” Ryder said. In some cases, treatment would be limited to people with formal diagnoses of mental illness.

Ryder believes that if the community understood the effects of such cuts, they would rally.

“If these cuts take place, children, families, elderly people — some of the most fragile and vulnerable people — would be hurt,” she said.

dhartill@sunjournal.com

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