Legislation that is aimed at enabling Missouri Farm Bureau members to have affordable and reliable health care is now in the Missouri House, after being approved by the Senate.
It’s a top priority for Farm Bureau, which is Missouri’s largest general farm organization. Missouri’s 2025 session goes until mid-May, so the clock will play a role in whether Senate Bill 79 passes. State Sen. Kurtis Gregory (R-Marshall), who serves on the Senate Agriculture Committee, sponsored the bill. He notes Farm Bureau has members in all 114 Missouri counties:
“So know there could be someone living in downtown St. Louis or Kansas City or Springfield that’s a member that’s looking at the same thing that some of our rural families are looking at too. And that’s the cost of health care,” Senator Gregory says.
Senator Gregory notes Tennessee Farm Bureau has offered similar plans for 78 years and has a 98 percent retention rate. Missouri Farm Bureau says passage would help individuals and families and also rural Missouri’s hospitals and clinics.
Senator Gregory, a former Mizzou captain who farms in mid-Missouri’s Saline County, is optimistic that the Missouri House will approve the bill, which would essentially allow Missouri Farm Bureau to offer health insurance plans to members that are 30 percent less than comparable unsubsidized plans on the individual health insurance marketplace. Senator Gregory tells 939 the Eagle News that Senate Bill 79 is member-driven:
“Where their members are looking at other state’s Farm Bureaus that are doing it. There’s ten of them now. And seeing the savings that those state’s members are receiving, and the coverage they’re receiving,” Senator Gregory says.
He represents Cooper, Saline and Howard counties in the 939 the Eagle mid-Missouri listening area. The bill is aimed at enabling Missouri Farm Bureau members to have affordable and reliable health care. Senator Gregory says that while this is not a fit for everyone, it is a fit for some people:
“Eight to ten percent of people in Missouri are without coverage right now for varying reasons. (Missouri) Farm Bureau saw this as a solution to try to extend more coverage to those people that currently don’t have it,” Gregory says.
He notes the Missouri House has approved the bill for two straight years. Senator Gregory tells 939 the Eagle that he’s talked to House Speaker Pro Tem Chad Perkins (R-Bowling Green) and if hopeful of passage.
Click here to listen to 939 the Eagle news director Brian Hauswirth’s interview with State Sen. Kurtis Gregory (R-Marshall), regarding Senate Bill 79. Brian also asked about the recent EF-2 tornado in mid-Missouri’s Pilot Grove, which is in Senator Gregory’s district:
