Anti-Tobacco Activists Worried about State Budget
The pending state budget has spooked Pennsylvania’s anti-smoking activists. An annual payment the state gets as part of a legal settlement with tobacco companies is supposed to go to a number of health care sources. A couple of months ago, Gov. Ed Rendell told legislative leaders about a plan to redirect more than $300 million from that settlement into Pennsylvania’s general fund, which is basically a pot for all the state’s money that isn’t designated for a specific purpose.
Rendell spokesman Gary Tuma said the activists needn’t worry. He said the governor’s proposal amounts to a minor change in accounting that wouldn’t affect the amounts any agencies get. Besides, the proposal probably won’t pass anyway.
“I don’t think that’s going to be in the budget,” Tuma said.
But Joy Meyer, executive director of the Pennsylvania Alliance to Control Tobacco, said she’ll wait until she sees the final budget to relax. She said the state government has already been siphoning off tobacco settlement money for the past five years.
“At this point, we have no assurance that our program will be sustained,” Meyer said.
The state government passed legislation in 2001 specifying how money from the settlement is supposed to be distributed.
Meyer said 12 percent of that money is supposed to go toward smoking prevention and cessation programs. Since 2005, however, the legislature has redirected a portion. In 2005, $32 million got allocated for smoking cessation and prevention. For 2010, the proposed amount is $14.8 million.
Meyer said her group — a coalition that includes the American Lung Association, the American Heart Association and the American Cancer Society — already had to cut smoking prevention programs for middle and high school students.
Adam Bennett, smoking cessation coordinator for Hanover Hospital, said the funding for smoking cessation programs in York County was $187,000 in the current fiscal year, down from $487,000 the previous year.
In October, because of redirected tobacco settlement funds, the number of smoking cessation programs in York County dropped from nine to two, Bennett said.
Tuma said the governor’s tobacco fund proposal, even if it passes, doesn’t amount to any loss of money for the programs in question. He said the settlement money comes through in April or May. Previously, the legislature would officially designate it for the recipients in the coming fiscal year.
Under Rendell’s proposal, the state government would put the settlement money in its general fund when it arrives in 2011. Then sometime in the next fiscal year, which starts July 1, the legislature would release that money for its designated recipients.
State Rep. Ron Miller, R-Jacobus, said the anti-tobacco advocates are right to be worried. In his experience, the state government rarely relinquishes a funding source, even if it means broken promises.
“There are no guarantees,” Miller said. “It’s just a way to spend money you don’t have.”
About the lawsuit
Pennsylvania, along with 45 other states, filed a lawsuit against the tobacco industry and discount cigarettes like Marlboro, Pall Mall etc. The basis of the lawsuit was that the tobacco industry intentionally misled the public about health risks of tobacco use, indirectly forcing the states to bear the healthcare costs.
The resulting 1998 settlement netted Pennsylvania $206 billion, to be paid in annual installments. The state legislature passed a law in 2001 designating the settlement money for healthcare costs, because that was the ostensible reason for the lawsuit in the first place.
The law allocated the money as follows:
— Insurance for uninsured adults — 30 percent
— Health-related research — 19 percent
— Home and community-based care for seniors — 13 percent
— Tobacco prevention and cessation — 12 percent
— Hospital charity care — 10 percent
— Prescription drug prevention for seniors — 8 percent
— Endowment for future health programming — 8 percent
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