The vote by Congress to re-open the government is good news for families with kids on CHIP — the Children's Health Insurance Program — and for the hospitals, clinics and doctors that serve them. As part of Monday's deal on Capitol Hill, lawmakers have pledged to renew CHIP for another six years. 

Congress was always likely to re-authorize the program, which was created 20 years ago by both parties and has always been politically popular. But when the spigot would resume was one of the big what-ifs for state governments, especially those with precarious finances, like New York and New Jersey. Funding has been in limbo since last fall.

In a recent budget address, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said the state would be hard-pressed to make up the almost $1 billion dollars New York expects to get from CHIP in coming fiscal year.

Kirstin Mooney, the assistant vice president of regulatory and legislative policy at Montefiore Medical Center, says keeping low-income kids covered with CHIP preserves the economic health of the hospital system — and, more importantly, the physical health of children.

"As healthcare providers, we're really thinking: Can we make sure that young children who go to our school-based health centers receive vaccines?" Mooney said.

More than 100,000 children get health coverage through CHIP in New Jersey, and about three times that number do in New York. To qualify, children must come from households earning from one to four times the federal poverty level, depending on their ages.

New York also faces a cut of around $800 million in federal funding to safety-net hospitals that serve low-income communities. 

And the hits from Washington aren't even part of the projected $4.4 billion budget deficit facing Cuomo and lawmakers, as state revenues have failed to keep pace with spending. 

Problems with the budget must be resolved by April 1, when the 2019 fiscal year begins.