Around the state and, and talking to people. We just got a really great news that iowa has moved up to be the third best managed state in america behind only north dakota and wyoming. And we dont have the oil of north dakota or the coal they have in wyoming. So were pretty proud of the achievements that weve had. And we also have a Record Number of people employed in iowa now. Amanda mmhmm. Some big accomplishments. Lets dive right into some legislative issues. One of the things that a lot of iowans followed closely last session was the back and forth over Education Funding. Mr. Branstad yeah. Amanda the house and senate, they couldnt reach that agreement until the final hours of the session on those funding levels. They ended up settling on a 1. 25 increase in state aid and a one time cash infusion of 55. 7 Million Dollars. You later vetoed that extra money which kind of angered a lot of people. In fact, according to a Public Policy poll from over the summer that was done, 57 of iowans disapproved of that particular move to veto that funding. And priority of your administration is listed making iowa schools number one in the nation. So the question is how do you do that when the funding levels arent where superintendents and districts want them to be . Mr. Branstad well first of all, were using good, sound budgeting practices. I just came from the iowa taxpayers association. The number one item on their, um, principles amanda mmhmm. Mr. Branstad to protect good budgeting practices dont use onetime money for ongoing expenses. Thats what culver did. Got the state in trouble. Led to an acrosstheboard cut. Since i became governor weve got the states financial house in order. Weve increased Education Funding by 35 and were embarking on this teacher leadership and compensation program. Its 150 Million Dollar program being phased in over 3 years. This is the second year of it so next yearll be another 50 million. Amanda mmhmm. Mr. Branstad so we, first year was 50 million. Last, the year were in is 100 million next year. And every school they want to participate. So what were really doin is focusing on things that are gonna reward teachers for taking on more, more responsibility and improving student achievement. Last year i recommended twoyear funding for the leg, for schools. The legislature only approved one. Amanda mmhmm. Mr. Branstad and then they use onetime money which is violating our budgeting principles. Next year i would ask the legislature to approve in the early, not spend the whole session fighting over money, but lets focus on how we can improve education including approving the, uh, the uh, supplemental state aid within the first month of the session. Ill make my recommendation on the second day. I have to make my recommendation based on the december revenue estimate and i hope the legislature will then follow suit and make the decision early. More than anything else schools need stability and predictability on their funding. And they dont it being left to the end of the session like we saw last year. Amanda what about the superintendents who were hoping for, i heard a lot of them say 3 . That, thats kind of the inflation rate that they would like to have. Mr. Branstad well, my recommendation last year for this coming year would be 2. 45 . Thats on top of the additional money for the teacher leadership and compensation. Were also looking at putting more money into helping kids that are struggling in reading amanda mmhmm. Mr. Branstad with Summer School for those that are struggling in reading after 3rd grade. We dont want any child to be passed on from 3rd grade without mastering reading because if you havent mastered reading youre not gonna be able to master your other subjects. Amanda lets move on to another topic that was big from last session. Mental health care in iowa. You announced at the beginning of last session a plan to close two of the States Mental Health facilities at Mount Pleasant and clarinda. State lawmakers came up with a measure to keep them open and under state control. Another measure that you vetoed last against you on this, too. That same survey found that 63 of iowans disapproved of that decision so let me ask if you have any regrets about how all that has played out mr. Branstad no. Amanda or is playing out now. Mr. Branstad well first of all, when i came back as governor we decided that iowa needed to do what most of the other states in the country have done a long time ago and that is to change our Mental Health delivery system. And so we, we are in the process of doing that and that Mental Health redesign, instead of having the counties be responsible we went to a statewide system with regional delivery and the state is picking up more of the costs and reducing the property tax share. And we also with the iowa health and wellness plan have been able to get federal participation in this as well. I think its going very well. Were seeing more Services Offered close to home. Remember these Mental Health institutes, they werent accredited. They were built over 100 years ago. They were designed for an old system thousands of people. Thats not the way you wanna deliver modern Mental Health services. So i believe that the process were going through is working and we need to continue to move forward on it and just keeping these old institutions open wasnt the answer. Amanda alright. Well, we appreciate that youre gonna stick around with us for the next half hour or so. music amanda weve got him for the whole show, folks. chuckling amanda another topic that has a lot of people talking, changing iowas medicaid system. Well talk to the governor about the reasons to go music amanda welcome back. Were going to move our discussion now on to a big undertaking by the Branstad Administration thats happening right now. Moving iowas Medicaid Program to managed Care Organizations. Some positive news coming out late this week that three more Major Hospital systems have signed on to the plan. The university of iowa hospitals and clinics, unity point and Genesis Health system. That is good news because the criticism that weve been hearing from people in the industry is that not enough of these hospitals and Health Care Providers have signed on yet to give people a good idea of what their options are before the rollout date of january 1st. So weve actually contacted dhs for a couple of weeks now. Mr. Branstad yeah. Amanda i know theyre trying to compile all these numbers and that sorts of things. Do you know how many Health Providers which includes hospitals, physicians, clinics mr. Branstad oh, its thousands. Amanda have signed on . Mr. Branstad its thousands that have already signed on. And everyday we have dozens and dozens of additional ones. But now we have three of the big be mercy. And hopefully they will sign on as well. But the whole goal here is to make sure we can make a, a smooth transition and people will be able to go to providers that theyre, you know, that are available in their area and that theyre used to. And theyre gonna be able to get the same level of reimbursement as they received before. But by coordinating the services we hope that we can prevent duplication and unnecessary hospitalizations that occur when people are given one prescription by one provider and another one by another that conflicts with each other and theres no discussion between them. Amanda mmhmm. Mr. Branstad by having the coordination you can avoid these unhealthy outcomes. Amanda has that been a big enough problem under the mr. Branstad oh, yeah. Amanda states Medicaid Program that there was this need to overhaul the whole thing . Mr. Branstad well, 26 states have already done this including california. And the costs have been going up and up and health care has not improved. So the health of iowans under medicaid has not gone up, but our costs have gone up. So what were trying to do is come to a system that will provide better access, increase quality and avoid duplication and thereby provide some savings in addition to improving the health come, healthy outcomes for the, for the people on the medicaid system. Amanda one of the biggest concerns right now of this whole switch over is the timeline because right now we have less than a month to get all of this in place. The federal government still needs to approve this. The Iowa Hospital Association shared their concerns about getting everything ready with such an aggressive timeline. Take a listen here. Greg no other state in the country has tried to move their medicaid population allin into managed care in this compressed timeline. Our concern is we get to january one and we have a train wreck on our hands that we dont know how to manage. Amanda and as ive been out and about reporting that, thats a concern that i hear a lot is this january 1st rollout date. Are you gonna stick to that . Mr. Branstad well, yes. Last january and theres been over 300 meetings held across the state. Thousands of providers have already signed up. I understand the Hospital Association is concerned about changing to a new system that really focuses on improving outcomes. Theyre used to an old system where they got rewarded for procedures. But most people would rather stay healthy and not be going back to the hospital. So we think the new system will be a lot better and you know, the hospitals also didnt like the idea of going to the iowa health and wellness plan. We did that 2013. Its worked very well. Weve heard very few complaints about that. And i know its a significant change, but im confident its gonna give us a Better Outcomes and improve the, the health of iowa citizens and reduce the unnecessary hospitalizations from lack of coordination. Amanda it is such a big change and only a short amount there could likely be some hiccups involved. Mr. Branstadyeah. Amanda so are you ready to take responsibility when the fingers start being pointed . Mr. Branstad well, theyve already been pointed at us. And theyve made all kinds of accusations, but the truth is were following the experience of 26 other states. And we have experienced providers, managed Care Organizations that have done this in other states. And they are hiring people and contracting to do this here. Im confident they know what theyre doing. The Iowa Department of Human Services will oversee this and theyre working hard to make sure that when there is a challenge or a problem its addressed and its addressed quickly. And, and so i just encourage people to be patient and to, you kn, look out for their own interests. Protecting their own health and, and, and be open to taking advice that can help them with going back to the hospital if not necessary. Amanda youve talked about how this will streamline some of these processes. But how much money is this gonna save the state . Mr. Branstad well, the estimate is its gonna save 51 Million Dollars. Amanda mmhmm. Mr. Branstad and the legislature based its budget on that. Senate democrats wanted to count 102 Million Dollars savings, but that wouldve been a whole year. Amanda mmhmm. Mr. Branstad this is just for half of the year. This is just for the fiscal year. And, and of course were halfway through the fiscal year when we get to january one. So first of all we had to convince them not to double count the savings and now they wanna criticize putting it in place. You cant have it both ways so theyre trying to say yeah, were gonna double count the savings and then no, we dont wanna implement it. Its all being phased in. Amanda mmhmm. Mr. Branstad longterm cares being phased in over 2 years. The, the Mental Health services over 6 months. And people are gonna be able to maintain their providers and theyre gonna be able to get the same level of, of contract. Amanda where did the, the 51 million come from . Was it an estimate . Was it through formulas that it was figured out . Mr. Branstad well, based on the experience of the 26 other states that have done it they looked at that and they, they, and every year the department of Human Services gives us an estimate. Medicaid as you know is an entitlement program. Part of it is funded by the federal government, part of it by the state. And each year they give us an estimate. And the cost of medicaid has been going up and up and up. It was clear that it was unaffordable and unsustainable. We needed to do Something Different and yet we wanted to focus on things that would not just save money, but would improve healthy outcomes. Benefits. We didnt wanna cut benefits. Instead we wanted to try to coordinate the benefits so that we could actually help people make good decisions and get the advice from people that have experience and knowledge as why we decided to go this route. And we gave it a lot of thought and then weve had a very thoughtful and thorough implementation process. And, and now of course were just ready to begin the actual implementation. So far its all been planning and preparing amanda mmhmm. Mr. Branstad and educating people. And weve had over 300 meetings all over the state. Amanda and to give people at home an idea of how big this change is there are currently 560,000 iowans who are on medicaid. And it has been a successful state run program for decades. It also includes the Hawkeye Program that covers low income children and mr. Branstad which is managed care, by the way. Amanda which is, okay. Mr. Branstad thats, and, and so is Mental Health. Magellan manages that. So weve already had managed care in both of those programs and now were gonna make it for the whole Medicaid Program. Amanda and, but hawkeye is switching over too as well . Mr. Branstad right. Well, hawkeye is going from one managed care provider to a different one. Amanda okay. Mr. Branstad and, and so magellan has managed mental thats changing. And so a lot of the people thatve been employed by these companies that have been overseeing those programs are being hired by the new mcos, the new managed Care Organizations. Amanda so if the Hawkeye Program is working mr. Branstad yeah. Amanda as a managed care program now why change that . Mr. Branstad well, its gonna be under a different managed care program, but its, and its gonna be coordinated with all the other managed care programs we have. Amanda mmhmm. Mr. Branstad so basically what were saying is weve had experience with managed care in Mental Health and in hawkeye and now were gonna have a comprehensive program for managed care and were gonna have either 3 or 4 providers that are gonna be managing this throughout the state. Amanda alright. Our conversation will continue. Coming up next we ask the governor if any president ial candidates have caught his eye. music amanda stick around on this iowa. Amanda welcome back. Now on to something that we cover a lot here in iowa. The 2016 president ial race. Now you get a chance of course to meet all of the candidates who are coming through. And youve said that you wont endorse anyone before the caucuses. But were curious. Has anyone caught your eye in particular . Mr. Branstad well, we got a lot of really good candidates and i encourage em to come to iowa early and often. Go to all people. Answer their questions. Share their vision of where they should, where they wanna go. I kinda like governors so chuckling mr. Branstad and, and some of em have already dropped out, some of the governors have. Amanda right. Mr. Branstad but Chris Christie of course was chairman of the republican governors, helped me a great deal. Governor bush had a great recd in his state of, of florida. Um, so, but youve got a lot of other good candidates. Marco rubio and of course the big thing has been donald trump. Hes just kind of led the field and, and of course ive been impressed with dr. Ben carson and obviously a noted surgeon, a man of great convictions and, and i think a very thoughtful and caring person. So theres a lot to choose from. chuckling mr. Branstad carly fiorina, i think articulate, knowledgeable, got a lot of different people to choose from and i have a lot of trust in iowa caucus goers that theyll choose the one they think will be the strongest and best leader. We have some huge threats in our coury right now. Isis and whats happening throughout the world and even right here in america with the threats from these islamic militants. Amanda well, coming up next were gonna take a look back into the archives and what does governor branstad want to be his music od and confident about the election, the way things have gone. I think its gonna go very well. So if its close i think well be chuckling mr. Branstad getting a good boost en this one comes in, but im hopeful that its gonna be decisive. Amanda and that folks was a much younger mr. Branstad commenting on the upcoming 1986 election where he would be reelected to a second term in office. Mr. Branstad that was right at the depth of the farm crisis amanda mm. Mr. Branstad after we had closed 38 banks and land values dropped 63 . That was my toughest election. Amanda hmm. Mr. Branstad but i think of how we could diversify the economy, invest in Renewable Fuels and bring more business and industry and jobs to the state. And im proud to say weve done that not only once, but im doin it again a second time and i feel like im older and wiser and were proud of the progress were makin. But, you know, its, its a battle everyday. Amanda what do you want your legacy to be . Mr. Branstad that i came in with the farm crisis of the 80s, one of the most challenging difficult times in the state and i, i left the state i