CHARLESTON, W.Va. — House Speaker Tim Armstead (R-Kanawha, 40) wants more details on how Planned Parenthood is being funded through West Virginia’s Department of Health and Human Resources.
“I just think it’s incumbent upon us legislators to ensure that money is sent to organizations that the public has confidence in,” Armstead said on Wednesday’s MetroNews “Talkline,” a day after sending a letter to the DHHR requesting information about all state funding for Planned Parenthood.
In her initial response to that request, Karen Bowling, secretary of the state Department of Health and Human Resources, said $66,000 out of $2.4 million in federal funds from a Title X federal block grant was provided to Planned Parenthood in Vienna, the organization’s only location in West Virginia, during the past year.
That money is for cervical cancer screenings, breast cancer screenings, treatment for sexually transmitted diseases and family planning services, according to Bowling, who said Planned Parenthood used it to provide services to more than 650 women in 2015 via the Family Planning Program and Breast and Cervical Cancer Screening Program.
In a statement, Bowling noted abortion services are not provided through those two programs.
This year, Bowling said the DHHR allocated $800,000 total for the purchase of bulk supplies for an estimated 150 provider sites in West Virginia that offer family planning services.
She has pledged to provide more details about those expenditures to Armstead and other legislators.
“DHHR is committed to ensuring that quality women’s health services are provided to all areas of the state,” Bowling said.
Armstead is raising questions about state funding for Planned Parenthood because of hidden-camera videos from anti-abortion activists that recently surfaced which implied that the group was selling fetal tissue to researchers, though the editing of those videos has been challenged.
“It really bothers me and I just really can’t understand how anyone on either side of the aisle, as a member of any organization, could be trying to defend this. I just can’t really see that,” he said of the videos.
The issue is Planned Parenthood specifically, Armstead maintained, not funding for women’s health care as a whole.
“It’s not our goal, it’s not our intention to take funding away from health care programs for women in our state,” Armstead said on Wednesday’s MetroNews “Talkline.” “Let’s just be clear, there are a number of different organizations and health care providers in our state that can provide those very services and that money can be used by those organizations.”
On Capitol Hill, the U.S. House has voted to defund Planned Parenthood for a year, while the U.S. Senate is expected to take a procedural vote Thursday on a bill that would put Planned Parenthood’s current funding into other community health centers.
The debate about funding for Planned Parenthood could potentially hold up the finalization of a larger spending bill to replace the one that expires on Sept. 30 — the close of the 2015 federal fiscal year.