House Majority Leader Amy Stephens is no fan of "Obamacare," the term she and other Republicans prefer to use for the federal health reform law passed last year and officially called the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

Stephens, R-Monument, is co-sponsoring legislation that would allow Colorado to join other states in opting out of the law.



Stephens has agreed to be the House sponsor for a Senate bill with Sen. Betty Boyd, D-Lakewood, that would set up the insurance exchanges in Colorado. The two have not finalized the bill, which is expected to be introduced soon.

Reforms passed by Congress last year require states to set up the exchanges by 2014, or the federal government will step in and do it for them. However, states have a good deal of flexibility in setting up exchanges.

Initially, the exchanges would be open only to individuals and to businesses with fewer than 100 employees. The idea is that individuals and businesses could band together to get better prices and health care options the way big companies now negotiate for health insurance.

Importantly, though, the exchanges also could allow individuals to determine whether they qualify for insurance subsidies or Medicaid.

Boyd said she and Stephens had each been eyeing legislation to set up the exchanges and decided it made sense to talk about combining their bills and seeking a compromise.

"It's something we both see as a standalone, Colorado-specific thing regardless of what happens nationally," Boyd said.

Boyd means that regardless of whether the federal law is ultimately overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court — and there have been conflicting lower-court rulings on its constitutionality — an exchange in Colorado would still be beneficial.

Forty-eight states have applied for federal grants to help set up the exchanges.

Utah already has set up an exchange for small businesses, but not individuals, while Massachusetts for years has used a "connector" system, similar to an exchange, that helps individuals and small employers find coverage.

A number of conservatives have said states shouldn't set up exchanges or comply with any portion of the law, which they expect the U.S. Supreme Court will strike down because it mandates Americans buy health insurance.

John R. Graham, director of Health Care Studies at the Pacific Research Institute, a California-based free-market think tank, said exchanges are a "lose-lose bet."

"If Obamacare persists, exchanges will become bloated administrative nightmares," Graham wrote in a column this month. "If Obama care is defeated, states will have wasted time and energy that should have been directed towards that effort. Obamacare is President Obama's problem."

Stephens also is co-sponsoring a bill with Rep. B.J. Nikkel, R-Loveland, that would allow Colorado to join an interstate compact to opt out of the federal law and regulate health care at the state level.

But on exchanges, Stephens said there's value regardless of whether Obama wants them.

"Most people viewed exchanges as the most free-market part of Obamacare," she said.

Tim Hoover: 303-954-1626 or