COLUMBUS – A bill that aims to divert more than $1 million in government money away from Planned Parenthood passed the state Senate Wednesday after Democrats and other opponents claimed it threatens access to health care services.
READ MORE: In The Columbus Dispatch
The proposal targets grants that the organization receives through the Ohio Department of Health supporting initiatives for HIV testing, breast and cervical cancer screenings, prevention of violence against women and others and redirects them to community and alternative health care centers that provide comprehensive women’s and children’s health services, Senate President Keith Faber (R-Celina) said.
“These public funds will now provide additional vital health services to women and children in Ohio,” said Faber.
A similar bill is pending in the House.
The legislation follows the release of secretly recorded videos by anti-abortion activists showing Planned Parenthood employees describing how they provide fetal tissue from abortions for medical research. Planned Parenthood says the videos are deceptively edited.
The measure passed on a 23-10 vote Wednesday after clearing a committee earlier in the day, during which more than 20 people from across the state provided testimony both for and against the legislation.
The decision to bring the bill to a vote came after two hearings instead of the standard three — a fact that many Democratic senators railed against in their opposition to the bill. Assistant Minority Leader Charleta Tavares (D-Columbus) pointed to what she considered to be unfair treatment of the bill, as the committee overseeing it includes mostly Republicans and only one woman.
Sen. Bill Coley, R-Liberty Township, the committee chairman, said more than 50 people had signed up to testify at Wednesday’s hearing but insisted that a third hearing would only slow the process of approving a bill he was confident would pass.
“We want to get it moving and get it enacted into law as quick as possible,” he said.
According to Faber, 25 Planned Parenthood clinics in Ohio do not provide prenatal care or mammograms and the organization’s annual report claimed 94 percent of services to pregnant women were abortions, but Tavares argued defunding the clinics in Ohio would leave large number of women without affordable health care.
“Twenty-six of the twenty-eight Planned Parenthood centers are located in medically underserved areas,” she said “The health care system in Ohio simply does not have enough providers to absorb all of the patients currently served by Planned Parenthood. We are placing personal politics ahead of the wellbeing of women across the state of Ohio.”
According to The Columbus Dispatch, in the last fiscal year, the state gave $3.7 million to Planned Parenthood. But taking out Medicaid reimbursements, the total was $1.3 million.