Coverage looks assured for retired miners

CONGRESS

WASHINGTON — Ohio Sens. Sherrod Brown and Rob Portman say a new federal spending bill will guarantee permanent health-care benefits for 22,000 retired coal miners and their dependents who were on the verge of losing their coverage by the end of the week.

Although lawmakers still have to approve a solution to salvage the coal miners’ threatened pensions, the announcement Monday effectively means they will have the health benefits for life. It impacts about 332 retired miners or dependents in Ohio.

The $1.3 billion for the next 10 years was tucked into a $1 trillion spending bill that would keep the federal government open until the end of September. Congress is expected to pass the spending bill this week.

“It’s a huge victory for the coal miners,” Brown, a Democrat, said Monday on CNN. Portman, a Republican, said in a statement, “These miners worked hard, played by the rules, and were promised these health-care benefits, which — without this agreement — they would lose.”

Last year, a Senate committee approved a bill that would have protected the miners’ pensions and health benefits. But the latest spending bill only includes money for the health benefits, although Brown said Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, has pledged to devise a solution this year for the pensions.

“We’ve got more work to do to ensure that these miners have access to the pensions they’ve earned,” Brown said in a statement.

Congressional action is needed because the pensions and health benefits for the United Mine Workers members were jeopardized when some coal companies dropped their coverage after filing for bankruptcy.