SALEM — Democrats in the Legislature are trying to force a special election in January if petitioners are successful in putting the recently passed health care provider tax on the ballot for a statewide vote.

While Democrats say they are trying to preempt a Medicaid funding crisis, the attempt prompted ire from State Rep. Julie Parrish, R-Tualatin/West Linn.

In Oregon, voters can gather signatures to refer non-emergency legislation for a vote in the general election. After the final gavel falls on the legislative session, petitioners have 90 days to file a petition with the Secretary of the State to refer legislation to the ballot.

A proposed amendment to Senate Bill 229 would schedule a special election for January 2018 on referrals from this session, rather than wait for the November general election. It would also transfer responsibility for writing ballot titles from the Attorney General’s Office to a bipartisan legislative committee.

State Rep. Dan Rayfield, D-Corvallis, says that holding a special election next January would give the Legislature time to find a resolution in the event the health care provider tax, designed to pay for Medicaid by assessing hospitals, insurers and coordinated care organizations, is struck down by voters.

While several Senate Republicans voted in favor of the tax last week, it first faced a tougher battle in the Oregon House of Representatives, narrowly meeting the required three-fifths majority vote with one Republican’s approval. Parrish voted against it, and argues that Democrats didn’t consider an alternative funding plan for Medicaid.

Less than two weeks before legislators must adjourn and balance the budget, Parrish argued that the move could affect other controversial revenue-raising measures that could be passed by legislators, namely a proposed transportation package that includes increases to the gas tax, and another proposal that would collect more revenues by restructuring small business taxes.

Parrish cast the proposed amendment as a partisan move to reduce turnout and potentially impact the results.

“Our Constitution allows voters the right to petition their government in a fair and equitable manner,” Parrish wrote in an email to The Portland Tribune, in what appeared to be a message sent to multiple media outlets Tuesday night. “The regularly scheduled general election is when the widest population of voters turn out for an election. The net effect of bypassing the general election is akin to voter suppression.”

But a January special election on a referral is not without precedent. A special election was held in January 2010 as a referendum on two tax increases passed by the Legislature in 2009.

That year, Measures 66 and 67 were approved by voters and took effect in late February.

However, Paul Gronke, a professor of political science at Reed College and director of the Early Voting Information Center, said he did not see “any particular partisan advantage” in putting tax measures on the ballot in a special election.

Gronke wrote in an email Wednesday that January voters are “committed voters and more partisan voters, and in general, those voters are older, higher income, better educated and in Oregon, lean more conservative (in the context of a very liberal state overall).”

Oregon already has a system for assessing certain urban hospitals based on their net revenues. The legislation passed last week would maintain that assessment and create a .7 percent tax on those urban hospitals, start an assessment on rural hospitals, and create a tax on insurance premiums.

The new taxes are poised to raise more than $600 million in the next two years and draw down nearly $1.9 billion in federal funding to help pay for the Oregon Health Plan, Oregon’s version of Medicaid. It would also help reduce a $1.4 billion gap between projected revenues and expenses in the state’s upcoming two-year budget.

Rayfield said that if voters reject the tax at the ballot box, the Legislature could address the Medicaid shortfall in its month-long session in February 2018.

Under the proposed amendment, the Legislature, through a committee with membership from both parties and from both the House and Senate, would have say over writing the ballot title, according to Rayfield.

The Attorney General’s Office writes ballot titles.

Parrish sees it differently. The proposed amendment specifies the ballot title-writing committee would include two members from the majority party and one member from the minority party from each chamber.

“To usurp the ballot titling authority from the Attorney General, and redistribute that power to the Legislature for partisan purposes (is) wholly unacceptable, and voters should be allowed to weigh in on that decision as well,” Parrish wrote.