* Gov. Pat Quinn will unveil his Medicaid plan today at 3 o’clock in Springfield. The live stream will be here. You can follow Tweets from the presser on today’s live session coverage post.

Quinn is likely to propose steep cuts in provider reimbursement rates and a buck a pack cigarette tax hike. The Tribune looks at some other cuts...

One program on the list for possible elimination is Illinois Cares Rx, which provides discount drug coverage for 180,000 low-income seniors and people with disabilities across Illinois.

Also under consideration is limiting eligibility for adults enrolled in the Family Care health insurance program, which charges small co-pays and monthly premiums for services ranging from doctor visits to dental care and prescription drugs. If guidelines are changed, more than 26,000 people would no longer qualify for coverage. […]

Other ideas include eliminating a number of so-called “optional” services the state provides that are not required by the federal government, including getting rid of group psychotherapy for some patients and no longer funding chiropractic visits for adults. Podiatric care would be restricted to patients diagnosed with diabetes, and new limits would be placed on how often a patient could receive things like new dentures and eyeglasses or have a wheelchair repaired.

Additional cost-saving proposals include beefing up efforts by the state to ensure people who no longer qualify for Medicaid aren’t receiving benefits, and more standardized measures of care that emphasize prevention. Other ideas include reviewing medicines a patient receives to make sure they are all needed and adding or increasing co-pays for certain services.

* Meanwhile, on the other big issue of the day, pension reform, the AP talked to a member of the commission tasked with coming up with a plan…

State Sen. Michael Noland, an Elgin Democrat, says committee members have discussed adjusting cost-of-living increases. Suggestions include temporarily suspending annual pension increases to help the state catch up on the $80 billion funding gap in its five pension systems or scaling COLA increases to an employee’s length of service.

Other ideas include raising the retirement age, demanding greater employee contributions and requiring the state to pay annual pension obligations before anything else.

Noland said they have not specifically addressed asking local school districts to pick up employer contributions for their teachers that the state now pays, an idea Quinn has discussed in the past.

“The work has largely been done. The practical considerations are well understood here,” Noland said. “Now it becomes more of a political discussion.”

* And while Speaker Madigan, Gov. Quinn, Senate President Cullerton and Mayor Emanuel have all talked about how unfair it is that the state picks up the employer portion of the pension contribution for Downstate and suburban schools, but not for Chicago’s, the Chicago Teachers Pension Fund would like more state cash…

Public pensions throughout Illinois are hurting, and that includes the Chicago Teachers Pension Fund (CTPF).

It’s underfunded by millions of dollars. Senate Bill 3628 would have the state of Illinois pump $270 million into the fund next year. After that, the state’s contributions would be pegged at 10 percent of what the state gives to the Teachers Retirement Fund, which is for teachers outside of Chicago.

“State funding to the pension fund would be extremely important,” Kevin Huber, director of the Chicago Teachers Pension Fund, said before the Pensions and Investments Committee of the Illinois State Senate. “We need help from the state.”

Huber told the committee that from 1988 to 2009, the state contributed $65 million annually to the CTPF. But in 2010, that contribution dropped to $10 million a year.

“When it drops like that, then it becomes problematic,” Huber said. “I believe the CPS (Chicago Public Schools) needs help from the pension fund matter from the state.”

Hmm. The paranoid section of my brain wonders whether this months-long debate was really designed to force a deal to spend more state money on Chicago teacher pensions.

* Roundup…

* Teachers pension fund paid a whopping $1.3 billion in fees . . . for what?

* IL House unanimously OKs Madigan’s pension amendment

* House unanimously OKs referendum on tougher votes for pension boosts

* Quinn Quiet on Plans to Cut

* House unanimously OKs referendum on tougher votes for pension boosts

* Madigan: Pension boosts should require more votes

* Our View: Group’s cuts in Illinois Medicaid fall short by about half

* Bills to eliminate legislative scholarships hit Senate snag: In response to complaints by Senate Minority Leader Christine Radogno, R-Lemont, Sen. Don Harmon, D-Oak Park, who chairs the executive committee, predicted that a bill would emerge from the subcommittee, which has three members.

* Heated scholarship program stalled in IL Senate

* Power plant backers say Illinois facility still viable: The looming closure of older, coal-fired power plants and a change in interest rates shows that a new power generator planned for central Illinois is still financially viable, backers of an experimental facility in Christian County said Wednesday. In a conference call with reporters, supporters of the $3.5 billion Taylorville Energy Center said the plant would fill some of the lost electrical generating capacity without causing a significant rate hike on consumers. Plus, the coal-to-gas plant being planned by Omaha, Neb.-based Tenaska could bring thousands of jobs to an economically depressed region of Illinois, said Paul Gaynor, chief of the public interest division of the Illinois Attorney General’s Office.

* Fracking’s impact on economy, environment should not be ignored

* Illinois can benefit from fracking in jobs, revenue

* Fracking comes to Illinois, for better or worse