Presentation of Idaho reports on Idaho Public Television is made possible through the generous support of the Laura Moore Cunningham Foundation, committed to fulfilling the Moore and Bettis family legacy of building the great state of Idaho.

With additional major funding provided by the estate of Darrell Arthur Kammer in support of independent media that strengthens a democratic and just society.

And by the Hansberger Family Foundation.

By the Friends of Idaho Public Television.

The Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

And donations to the station from viewers like you.

Thank you.

Lawmakers are looking to wrap up their business and head home, but there are still some major policy questions yet to be resolved.

So will the rush to the exits leave some unintended consequences in statute.

I'm Melissa Davlin.

Idaho Reports starts now.

Hello and welcome to Idaho Reports.

This week I sit down with Christine Tiddens, executive director of Idaho Voices for Children, to discuss proposed changes to the Idaho Child Care Program.

Then Senator Doug Okuniewicz and Senate Assistant Minority Leader James Ruchti share their thoughts on the waning days of the 2026 legislative session.

Finally, Toni Lawson of the Idaho Hospital Association joins me for a conversation on issues and opportunities facing rural hospitals.

But first, on Wednesday, the House passed a bill that would make changes to the Idaho Digital Learning Alliance, the state's virtual education provider, in an attempt to eliminate duplicate programing and narrow the scope of IDLA’s services.

I can't vote for this.

This this hurts my school districts and even the private schools up there.

We've had some charter schools and larger districts having entire grade levels take an IDLA course.

Is that what it's for?

That was not the intention when it began.

Nor should be the intention here.

The proposal would cut IDLA's budget in half.

That bill now advances to the Senate.

Superintendent of Public Instruction Debbie Critchfield raised concerns about cuts to the program.

Last Friday, in a press release, Critchfield said in part, Idaho's own state created provider, the Idaho Digital Learning Alliance, was reduced by 52%, while other virtual programs saw cuts of just 1.8%.

If fairness is the goal, we need to make sure our actions reflect that, especially when it comes to a program that was created to meet the needs of Idaho families.

Cancer patients in Idaho could soon be able to find less expensive insurance coverage for certain treatments.

On Wednesday, the Senate approved a bill that would require health insurers to cover oral and IV anti-cancer medications under the same cost sharing mechanisms, which cancer advocates call oral parity.

IV cancer treatments are typically given at a hospital and billed through that insurance system on the back end, while oral medications are prescribed at a pharmacy and typically paid for upfront.

Supporters say this will save patients money and time.

I have a kiddo that's been going.

Going through, sorry, this process for the last couple of years and as his mother have had the privilege, the opportunity to spend numerous hours with him.

Fortunately, he is now able to take oral medications, and he's in a maintenance phase right now.

So that is really opened up a lot for him.

This is supposed to be my going home bill.

I'm so happy to see this come to fruition.

It was in my freshman year as a as a legislator that I worked on the same issue.

And it took 12 years, but it's here, and I'm just so thankful.

That bill now heads to Governor Little for final sign off.

Another bill headed to the governor's desk this week seeks to block harmful addiction habits on social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram, from reaching young Idahoans.

Producer Logan Finney sat down on Wednesday after the final House vote, with the bill's sponsor, House Majority Caucus Chair Jason Crane, to discuss the requirements and concerns about privacy.

So if you read the bill, everything that was in that section was telling you this is what they are doing.

So no, we're not going to be collecting any information from the kids.

We're not going to that.

Age estimation is different than age verification.

And actually the Ninth Circuit just ruled recently that age estimation is absolutely supported by the Constitution.

You can do it.

Age verification is a different thing.

So we'll be using age estimation.

And how are they going to do that?

The same technology that they're using to find out who is Logan, what does he like, what is he interested in.

They find out your demographics to know what you like to know how to market you.

That's why your feed has some of those ads that you're like, that's interesting.

They learn you.

And so if they can do that, they can use that same thing to estimate to 80 to 90% accuracy how old a child is.

And that's what we're going to ask them to do.

They won't be collecting any data You can find the rest of Logan's interview with Representative Crane online on the Idaho Report's YouTube channel, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Also on Wednesday, the Senate Health and Welfare Committee advanced a bill regarding the Idaho Child Care Program, or ICCP.

The proposal does three major things changes eligibility for families, including adding work or school requirements for parents and creating higher bars for income and assets.

Creates fraud prevention mechanisms, including mandated financial audits for nonprofit daycare centers and giving the state attorney general authority to pursue prosecutions in cases of suspected fraud, and moves the parameters for the program from administrative rules to statute.

We caught up with bill co-sponsor Representative Jordan Redman on Wednesday.

I think it's just really, making sure that we have integrity in the program.

I think that's super important with what we've seen in Minnesota.

And so I think this will build the strongest integrity in, in the daycare program and the child care in the country.

But not everyone agreed that this legislation was the best approach to making changes to ICCP, with some expressing concern that it creates too many hurdles for families and daycare participation, and others arguing the program shouldn't exist at all, as government shouldn't be in the child care business.

And not to mention that, really, this isn't the original intent of government to be in child care.

That is best left up to the family, to the church, the grandmas, to the neighbors.

Ultimately, the bill narrowly passed out of committee.

After the vote, I sat down with Christine Tiddens, executive director of Idaho Voices for Children, to hear her concerns with the bill.

Thanks so much for joining us.

Can you outline your major concerns with this proposal?

Yeah.

I mean, really it kind of took us by surprise.

The bill popped up.

We didn't get any input on it.

I don't know of any providers or parents who really had a say.

And so by taking all of the rules and putting them in statute, it's not a clean transfer.

And really, what it is, is a total rewrite of the Idaho Child Care Program, on top of the program integrity language that the sponsors, I think really were aiming to get added.

And so let's talk about how many kids specifically might be affected by changing the eligibility.

So the Idaho Child Care Program serves about 6500 Idaho kids across Idaho, across the state.

And they, receive services in about 1000 providers.

So when we talk about the Idaho Child Care Program, we're talking about a program that helps thousands of parents be able to afford child care and go to work and then keep these businesses in operation that are so key, the backbone to our economy.

This is a year where a lot of people are taking some haircuts with their budgets, right?

Why should this program be any different?

The Idaho Child Care Program is primarily a federally funded program.

It's subsidies that are given to lower income families that go to providers to really ensure that they're working.

So it's not like, a lot of the other traditional welfare programs that we talk about.

This actually enables the economy to keep moving and families to earn a paycheck.

Let's talk a little bit more about the foster care eligibility that is currently in administrative rule.

That did not make it into this proposed rewrite.

What's the issue there?

Yeah.

So the proposed rewrite takes about 19 pages of administrative rules, puts it down into about 3 or 4 pages in statute.

So a lot is missing.

And I truly think in the rush attempt to put together this bill, there were accidents that got left behind.

And one of the issues that I had brought up was, exclusions to eligibility income.

So foster families, currently participate in the Idaho Child Care Program so their foster children can go to child care centers near them and receive the full subsidy, with this rewrite, the exclusion of foster parent income was unintentionally left out.

So this could affect, you know, the hundreds of foster children who currently participate in the program.

And long term, you know, really threaten the ability of foster families to take children into their home if they can't have affordable childcare.

I mean, child care is so expensive, it likely would be a wash or cost even more to pay for foster care, for child care for a foster child, than it would be for the subsidies that you get for being a foster parent.

There was some indication within the meeting from the Director of Health and Welfare that that that omission was inadvertent, that they didn't mean to.

Do you have any sense that they're going to go back and try to fix this?

If this proposal does advance after it passed out of the Health and Welfare Committee?

I am not certain.

There was a motion made in committee to send it to the amending order, and that motion didn't even receive a second.

So I don't have an anticipation that it will happen, especially as things are moving so quickly.

I agree, I think it was unintentional.

The question is, is there a route to fix it?

And do we have time to do it this legislative session?

There was a lot of discussion in the proposal around fraud prevention, making sure that the attorney general has the ability to investigate and pursue charges against people who are accused of fraud, making sure that there are back checks, to make sure that people are using the money as intended.

Does Idaho Voices for Children oppose those proposals?

No.

And, you know, looking at the federal regulations and requirements around what is being called program integrity or looking into investigations of fraud, that that language is pretty straightforward.

I will say talking to providers across the state, they are being really good sports.

They are doing everything right.

They're following the rules.

All of them received reviews or audits in the last several months to prove that they're doing everything right.

If we want to really talk about program integrity being the purpose of legislation, then I'd recommend moving forward just with that.

And if if we're unintentionally leaving out other pieces of really important childcare infrastructure, that we take time to address that together with the industry experts.

Some people who oppose this bill didn't oppose it because they felt like it would hurt families.

They thought that government didn't have a place in child care in the first place.

What would you say to those critics of the ICCP program?

You know, child care is so key to families being able to make it paycheck to paycheck and to really get ahead.

The cost of sending a little one is usually more than college tuition, more than a mortgage on a house.

It is incredibly expensive.

And so it is an important economic support to help folks, parents, stay ahead and be able to work while they know that their children are in safe settings.

All right, Christine, thank you so much for joining us.

Thanks.

About the foster child eligibility, bill co-sponsor Representative Redman later told Idaho reports that he was under the impression that another section of the administrative rules addresses foster family eligibility.

There was a misreading of the rules, actually, I think that they've already done that from the ICCP program into the daycare program.

They've already moved those rules, the department has.

And so I'm not concerned about that.

Okay.

So this isn't something that you think needs to be amended because my, my understanding from the hearing was it was an inadvertent thing that was left out.

Do you have new information since then?

No.

Honestly, I think that those rules have already been moved into the daycare statute.

But during the committee meeting on Wednesday, the Department of Health and Welfare acknowledged that this change may inadvertently leave out foster children.

I reached out to IDHW for clarification, but didn't hear back by deadline.

I also asked Idaho Voices for Children and Tiddens pointed out that this bill would put daycare, licensing and the ICCP program in completely different sections of statute, and that the foster eligibility exemption hadn't yet been addressed.

So much of the conversation this year has focused on the budget.

But here to give us a policy update is Senator James Ruchti and Senator Doug Okuniewicz.

Senator Okuniewicz, let's start with you and your proposal to change how the heads of the Departments of Transportation, Fish and Game and Parks and Rec are appointed.

What prompted this proposal?

I think a number of things I, have served on the germane committees for those three departments, those three agencies, since I started in the legislature.

And one of the things that I noticed and, I know other folks noticed, because I've talked to other legislators, is that, because they are semi-autonomous, basically, the directors are not appointed by the governor or they're never confirmed by the Senate.

They tend to push a little bit more into the, what I call the policymaking arena than, than I like.

And not always, but oftentimes, and, you know, a number of examples that I share in committee and stuff with our, you know, regarding Parks and Rec and, and, Fish and Game.

I haven't personally haven't had as much of an issue with Transportation, but I felt that all three should be treated the same.

And I also recognize the fact that as the chairman of the Transportation Committee, I might be getting a little bit better treatment.

That's kind of how things go sometimes.

So I did think all three needed to be treated the same way.

Particularly similar to the rest of, the rest of our agency's work.

I think things work really well in our government.

And that was the the driving force behind it.

And I'm certainly happy to share, you know, some of the examples if you'd like, but.

I'm curious and, you know, to back up a little bit, you know, for people who aren't familiar with the proposal, what would it change from the current system?

Yeah.

So currently those directors, the three directors for Fish and Game, Parks and Rec and Transportation are appointed by their boards of directors.

And those boards are appointed by the governor.

They, all all of them, are confirmed by the Senate.

But the directors are not.

And so what happens?

And I'm not positive exactly what happens.

It sometimes feels like the directors are running their boards.

Sometimes it feels like the boards are setting the directors on, you know, fool's errands, where they're kind of setting them in to run into the buzzsaw at the legislature.

And it's difficult for me to tell which is which, in which case.

But, the ultimate result is they sort of drift into policymaking.

And, and an example would be, you know, we've had a lighted nocks, I guess would be a good example for bow, for bow hunting.

Years as we were the last state in the country that didn't allow that technology to be used.

And, you know, we had legislators asking, the Fish and Game department or division agency to implement some rules that would allow them and they didn't.

And then, a legislator, it was, Representative Brandon Mitchell brought legislation to legalize it and make it happen.

And then they show up in committee.

So the first step is they don't do something by rule that they could have done by rule they refuse to when asked by more than one person, in the legislature.

And then when a law, proposed law comes in, they came out full force, tried to stop it in committee, and we don't see that a lot with most of our other agencies where they're actually getting it.

And frankly, I would argue we don't see it at all, or they'll come in and take a strong position.

They're there in an advisory capacity, but they don't typically come in and argue, against or for something.

And so that happened in that case.

And one of the lines that came out, from, you know, and I like our director and I think he'll do a good job under the new structure.

But he was there and he, he said that, at the end of the day, they didn't think it was a decision that should, you know, fall to the legislature.

They thought more properly fell to them.

And, you know, we can agree to disagree, but we make policy and agencies implement.

So, that that was a, an example of, of that.

And that was from some years ago.

So and I want to bring you into the conversation.

You had concerns with this proposal.

Well, I did.

I mean, before we make changes, significant changes, we should always ask ourselves, why are we doing it the way we are doing it right now?

And when it comes to, for example, Fish and Game, that system was implemented by initiative and it established a professional system, that was insulated from politics to manage our fish and game in the state.

Same thing happened with the Department of Parks and Rec when the Harriman brothers donated Harriman Park, which is a gem that we have in this state.

One of the brothers was Republican.

One was Democrat.

And they when they conveyed that property to the state of Idaho, they did it in exchange for a promise that a park system would be established by the state of Idaho, which it was in 1965, with a and these are words from the contract, professionally staffed career Park Service, whose personnel shall be chosen on the basis of merit alone.

That's significant.

They recognized.

Which we will we will see a change in how these departments are run.

They will pay more attention to politics.

They will pay more attention to chairmen of of, certain committees.

They'll pay attention to leadership.

They'll pay attention to the governor's office more, to our detriment.

If you're in southeast Idaho, in a small community, you don't want politics entering into the discussion about whether the local state park is being taken care of, or whether a road or bridge is being fixed.

And once you enter politics.

Once, it's no longer insulated from political decisions, the people of Idaho will suffer as a result.

These concerns were brought up multiple times in committee and in floor debate.

Were any of them persuasive to, you.

No.

And neither is that one.

Jim and I know each other very well, but, the ours is a political system from the very beginning.

You know, the Founding Fathers set our system of governance up, particularly, what was it?

It's, Federalist 76 and 77 go into great detail about the importance of appointments by the executive with confirmation by the Senate.

So this just follows from that.

The notion that the governor is incapable of selecting someone on the basis of merit alone strikes me as a logical fallacy.

I think he or she will be motivated to do that because it's the right thing to do.

They do that with all the other agencies currently, and the nice thing about the new situation is that we'll now have a second stop from an independent entity, the Senate in this case, that will be able to, look at that nomination and decide whether or not that's the best choice.

And as far as the the Parks and Rec director goes, make sure that it confer or conforms and comports with the Harriman agreement.

So you've got two bites at that apple as opposed to today where you have political appointees who hire that director, and that director serves at their pleasure today.

It could be fired today, by that entity.

And there's not a second group to confirm or make sure that they're picking the most qualified person for that position.

And that's not to say that I don't think the current director is qualified.

I think she is.

She does a great job and will continue to do so.

But yeah, so I didn't see that as much of a problem.

You just had a proposal go to the governor after passing unanimously, slightly less controversial on guardianship and conservation ship.

Can you...conservatorship.

Sorry.

Yeah, right.

Can you walk us through that?

Yeah.

So, it was a comprehensive rewrite of our guardianship and conservatorship laws.

And we haven't done that since 1972.

Some states did it around 1997.

We didn't do it at that time.

So it's been a long time coming.

And we're getting, rave reviews about the legislation from those attorneys and, and, judicial members who practice in this area.

But essentially it raises the bar before a person's rights can be taken away or limited under a guardianship or conservatorship.

We made sure that they have to be clearly proven to need that extra help.

It requires a judge to look at less onerous avenues that can be used instead of a full on guardianship or conservatorship, power of attorney, for example, or supported decision making.

Which, by the way, I think was a topic on The Pitt that that, TV show that a lot of people are watching now, the supported decision making.

And then there's additional protections if a guardianship is established.

And so we've it took us about, three years in the legislature to get this passed because we just slow walked it to make sure we were getting all the, all the concerns and criticisms brought out.

And we were able to do that.

As a result, it passed both houses unanimously.

It's been signed by the governor.

That's right.

We have, about 30s left.

So in a sentence, what do you see as the major issues that you need to address before the legislature adjourns?

Just the budgets.

We just need to get budgets passed and get the budget balanced.

It's going to be budgets.

And, you know, we're going to see, the results of that in the coming months as people start to recognize what's happened to our state budgets.

Senator, thank you so much for joining me.

Thank you.

Late last year, the federal government announced that Idaho would receive nearly $1 billion in federal funds for the Rural Health Transformation Program, created to improve health care access in rural areas.

That $1 billion will come over the course of five years, and lawmakers, including Representative Redman, have already said they would like oversight on how that money is spent.

If we don't do this, then it will just be left up to the executive branch.

And you know what?

I think we have a great executive branch.

However, I do think this is part of the purview of the legislature, and I think it's our responsibility to oversee it.

Joining me to discuss the Rural Health Transformation Program and the future of those funds is Toni Lawson of the Idaho Hospital Association.

Toni, first of all, what are the parameters on how these funds can be spent over the next five years?

So there are actually a long list of guidance and guidelines.

And one thing I think the most important is that you can't use these funds to just, fill in holes that you've had because of cuts or other things.

It has to be new, transformative, programs.

So I think a lot of folks thought, well, we have all this money coming in, we can fill in the holes where we've made cuts.

You can't.

It needs to be new programs.

It needs to be transformative programs.

There has to be a sustainability piece connected to it.

It's a pretty complex process.

And the federal government has a fairly long list of, restrictions and guidelines.

So you already have these parameters, and I imagine that there's no ongoing money.

I mean, this is five years worth of funds, but that's it.

On top of that, the legislature would like oversight on how that money is spent.

How does the Idaho Hospital Association feel about those proposals?

We understand the urge, you know, or that desire to have oversight.

I think our concern is whether or not oversight slows the process.

There is a very limited timeline on what you have to do to use these funds, and the first year of funds have to be obligated by October 30th.

And so our concern right now is oversight is fine, but let's not make it so burdensome that it slows the process down.

I don't know that a lot of legislators understand how complex the process is, how complex the reporting requirements are.

We still have potentially hundreds of entities who want to submit proposals for funding.

So review of all the proposals to make decisions about the proposals, to decide whether or not they meet the regulatory guidelines that are there.

And then there's all the follow up reporting afterward to make sure the money's spent as intended.

And this isn't just for hospitals.

It could be public health districts or clinics in in rural Idaho, from what I understand.

Yes.

And there were hundreds of submittals for information when the department asked initially.

So I can only suspect we will have hundreds of proposals that come not only from clinics, rural hospitals, those folks, but there are, information technology vendors who are anxious to help us spend that money.

There are a lot of national vendors anxious to help us find programs to spend that money on.

I imagine too, public schools with school nurses.

There are so many different areas.

Yeah.

Possibilities.

Medical education is an area where we may be able to use some of those funds.

You couldn't supplant funds, ongoing funding of our medical education programs, but it could potentially be used as a start up for a new ob gyn residency or something like that.

We have a little bit less than a minute left, but, you said you understand the desire for legislative oversight.

Time is running out.

We still don't have an official proposal that's passed both the House and Senate for this oversight.

What message would you like to give to lawmakers as they're still considering this as a session winds down?

I've been putting it in Idaho terms for those that are fans of agriculture and water issues.

We need to make sure this water gets to the end of the row.

We can't quibble over what oversight looks like.

We need to make sure it happens.

It needs to happen immediately.

It needs to happen before the end of the session, or we risk losing $1 billion or half $1 billion, excuse me, that could go into rural Idaho.

They need to make a decision and make it fast.

Toni Lawson, Idaho Hospital Association, thank you so much for joining us, and thank you for watching.

For more, make sure you check out the Idaho Reports podcast again, available wherever you listen to podcasts.

We'll see you next week.

Presentation of Idaho reports on Idaho Public Television is made possible through the generous support of the Laura Moore Cunningham Foundation, committed to fulfilling the Moore and Bettis family legacy of building the great state of Idaho.

With additional major funding provided by the estate of Darrell Arthur Kammer in support of independent media that strengthens a democratic and just society.

And by the Hansberger Family Foundation.

By the Friends of Idaho Public Television.

The Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

And donations to the station from viewers like you.

Thank you.