BOISE — Regardless of what happens in the courts or at the federal level, Idaho will expand Medicaid on Jan. 1, Gov. Brad Little told a crowd of nearly 400 at the Boise Metro Chamber of Commerce on Wednesday.

“Everyone knows that we’re going to implement Medicaid on the first of January,” Little said during his first Address to the Business Community at JUMP in downtown Boise.

“We’re working our way through it,” Little said. “Seems like at the federal level, there’s either a court case or a change that makes that more difficult. Regardless of what changes take place, we’re going to get that done in Idaho.”

The governor said he was on the phone Wednesday morning with the federal director of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Seema Verma, about Idaho’s efforts.

“She and I are having quite a relationship, given all the things that we’re doing in Idaho right now,” he said.

Medicaid expansion, which Idaho voters approved by initiative in November with 61% voter support, is “going to make a difference in some of the other areas” where Idaho is facing its most “vexing” issues, Little said, including mental health and substance abuse.

“A lot of the people that are going to qualify need those services,” he said.

In addition, he said, “the affordability and the accessibility of health care” is a big one among issues Idaho faces.

Little said Medicaid expansion also will help lay the groundwork as Idaho addresses the opioid addiction crisis.

“When we get Medicaid expanded, then we’ll know where our weak links are, as to what we need to do to progress there further,” he said.

Little also addressed an array of other topics. Among them:

GROWTH: The governor said Idaho’s suffering “growing pains, especially in the areas of infrastructure, essential governmental services, education, transportation, social services and incarceration.”

The upsides of growth include more jobs, more diversity, and opportunities for Idahoans who’ve left to return, he said. “Those of us who’ve been around since earlier times remember when Idaho and Boise had no growth — in fact we were exporting many of our kids. I vastly prefer the situation that we have today.”

But the governor said Idaho needs to make significant investments, including in education and infrastructure.

EDUCATION: Little touted decisions this year to raise starting teacher pay and to double funding for literacy, and promised more to come from his education task force. “I’m very optimistic about the results,” he said, which will focus on literacy and college- and career-readiness for high school graduates. “Education is both our constitutional and our moral obligation,” he said, “and it’s my biggest priority.”

TRANSPORTATION: When more and more of Idaho workers’ time is taken up in commutes, Little said, the transportation system needs improvements.

“The most precious commodity anybody has is their time,” he said.

Idaho cities and the Associated General Contractors are working to update a study Little oversaw in 2010 of Idaho’s transportation needs, he said.

“Raising taxes or raising fees in Idaho should be difficult, and it always will be,” he said. “But if we collectively, communities, cities, businesses, all of us get together, I believe we can get this done.”

Asked about local-option taxes, Little said he worried about the “fringe effect” of local taxes, at the borders of where they apply.

PRISONS: “We’ve got an incarceration rate that I think is way, way too high,” the governor said. He touted the Legislature’s approval this year for three new reentry centers, to help transition inmates from prison to the community. “They teach job skills, they prepare inmates to reenter society, and importantly, they save taxpayer dollars.” Asked about easing mandatory minimum sentences, Little said he doesn’t favor doing away with all mandatory minimums, but is open to some changes.

REGULATIONS: He touted his administration’s efforts to reduce Idaho’s regulatory burden, saying, “I want to give credit to all the state agencies that rolled up their sleeves. … Believe me, the people that work for us in the state of Idaho have (drunk) the Kool-Aid about how we need to make the regulatory environment better, and the whole country is looking.”