SEIU wins on amendments for flawed health care bill

Bill Would Have Negative Impact on Public Health System

On Wednesday, April 16, 2008, the Service Employees International Union, California’s largest health care union, and several health care advocacy groups successfully pushed to reform a flawed bill that would have excluded health care coverage for low income children, and could have potentially lead to the closure of county hospitals and the loss of public service jobs.

The California Senate Health Committee still passed Senate Bill 1459, but only after SEIU and other advocates forced key members of the Senate to promise the following protections:

• Ensuring that important county services, including eligibility determination, are not jeopardized and thousands of jobs lost;
• Maintaining of resources for critical county health services;
• Providing health coverage for all children;
• Reconciling the Medi-Cal/Healthy Families streamlining.

In its original version, the bill would have created far reaching problems in the healthcare industry.

• Consolidated both the Healthy Families and Medi-Cal programs under one name “Cal-Health’;’ 
• Undermined county hospitals and clinics by cutting public hospitals out of efforts to provide coverage to adults without children at home, instead diverting funding to private insurance companies;
• Excluded coverage for many low-income children in California by leaving in place unreasonable requirements;
• Privatized the eligibility determination process, eliminating thousands of county eligibility worker jobs and denying  coverage for many who are eligible for public programs;
• Weakened existing laws on streamlining enrollment.

Senate Bill 1459 would undermine SEIU’s efforts to work with teams of advocates to ensure all Californians, especially children, have access to health care. Our union has worked for years to ensure that safety net health care systems, including public hospitals, emergency rooms and trauma centers, are adequately funded. Two other current bills under consideration, Senate Bill 32 (Steinberg) and Assembly Bill 1 (Laird) provide coverage for all children, streamline and simplify Medi-Cal and Healthy Families while protecting the county health care systems throughout the state.

Because our union members were in the committee room pushing to change the bill, the worst parts of Senate Bill 1459 were promised by the legislators to be eliminated from the legislation. But to guarantee that the most damaging elements of the bill will eventually be taken out, SEIU will be fighting the bill every step of the way through the process. It is the only way to ensure that the concerns of public health nurses are heard, and that low-income California families don’t suffer from the impacts of this legislation.