Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, July 12, 1994                   TAG: 9408030019
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B3   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: LAURA WILLIAMSON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

PAYNE REBUKED FOR STAND ON MANDATES

Payne "flip-flopped" on the issue, a chamber spokesman said, by casting the deciding vote last week on a House Ways and Means committee bill that would force employers to pay 80 percent of the cost of an employee's health insurance.

Two weeks ago, Payne supported an amendment to remove that part of the bill.

The Virginia Chamber of Commerce, meanwhile, had no comment on Payne's vote, though it has taken a position against employer mandates.

"I'd like to learn more about it and maybe even talk to him," said Hugh Keogh, president of the Virginia chamber. "We are typically very pleased with L.F. Payne."

A spokesman for Payne defended the Nelson County Democrat's vote, saying that he supported the bill only as a means of moving the health care debate onto the House floor, where "he will work to address the employer mandate issue" this summer.

"He and other members agreed the most important thing was to keep the process moving," said Ellis Woodward, a spokesman for the congressman whose district stretches from Charlottesville to Danville and includes Bedford, Franklin, Henry and Patrick counties and Martinsville.

Woodward stopped short of saying that Payne would vote against a final House bill that included employer mandates or that he would even try to remove the mandates.

"Payne has indicated a concern about employer mandates and job loss," he said.

Employer mandates would cost Virginia 26,700 jobs and $2.38 billion in lost wages and benefits, said Rick Del Vecchio, a spokesman for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

He did not specify what kind of jobs or what part of the state would be hardest hit.

Those figures are based on an analysis of President Clinton's initial health care reform proposal and not on the version passed by Ways and Means, Del Vecchio said, adding that the employer mandate clauses were similar.

"I don't have a specific number on the Ways and Means bill itself," he said.

The national chamber openly criticized only two members of the Ways and Means committee - Payne and Indiana Democrat Andy Jacobs.

Payne and Jacobs were "the only two who flip-flopped," Del Vecchio said.