Governor Bruce Rauner signed two bills Thursday afternoon that will bring changes to the state health system. These bills, SB 2385 and SB 2913, are expected to make the long-term care application process faster and cheaper.
“Today we make a major step to help streamline the bureaucracy process, make government more efficient and effective, provide higher quality care, services for our seniors, while making it more effective for taxpayers,” said Rauner.
Banks, health services and government bodies will now operate through the same centralized Medicaid database. Senator Dave Syverson of Rockford sponsored these bills.
“Families will be able to get resolution within weeks instead of months,” said Syverson.
The signing of the bills took place in downtown Rockford’s Amberwood Care Centre, a long-term care facility. Syverson said this location is significant. He represents Rockford and wanted the bills he worked closely with to be signed in that specific city.
The digitization of the Medicaid system follows a recent update to the voting system in Illinois. Rauner said these software changes symbolize modernization of Illinois on an IT level.
“We have won national awards over the last couple of years now in the state of Illinois for modernizing our IT systems and going from the bottom of the barrel to one of the most progressive states, in terms of computer sophistication and effective software. And this today is part of that process,” said Rauner.
Although Bill 2385 was passed to go into effect January 2019, officials say the new software system can be used as early as this month.
