(Host) Governor Peter Shumlin and other governors are worried about congressional plans to change the Medicaid health insurance system for the poor.
There have been proposals for Washington to give the states block grants. The states then would have to administer Medicaid with the amount of money provided.
Now, payments are based on the amount of health service that beneficiaries use.
Governor Shumlin has signed on with 16 other governors in an effort to preserve the existing Medicaid system.
He says the states already have tried a variety of innovative ways of holding down the costs of the program.
The governors say the proposal in Washington would hurt those efforts to cut costs and would, instead, force states to pay even more.