Speaker of the Assembly Has Made SB 840 (Kuehl) a Priority: Showdown with Governor Expected
Speaker of the Assembly Fabian Nunez joined Senator Sheila Kuehl and a huge crowd on the Capitol steps yesterday to pledge his support for SB 840 that would provide health care coverage through a single-payer plan to all Californians. This historic measure, that Senator Kuehl has shepherded through the State Senate on a partisan 25 to 15 vote, will be heard by the Assembly Appropriations Committee on August 16. Assuming it passes the committee, it will be voted on by the full Assembly and then need to pass the Senate as well before the legislature adjourns on August 31. This promises to be a battle royale in the legislature and questions abound as to how to get the Governor to sign rather than veto this legislation as appears to be the likely end result this year.
Senator Kuehl told the fired up crowd that “The Governor needs to hear from us.” She said that all we hear from his staff is “this piece isn’t going to work and that piece isn’t going to work….He must not veto this bill.” When the crowd shouted loudly “Ahnold, Ahnold, Ahnold,” they were hushed down by the President of the CSEA who introduced Nunez, saying he “joins us today to send the Governor a very strong message that hard working people deserve good jobs with good health benefits.”
Speaker Nunez did not disappoint the crowd. When he said “Health care is a right and not a privilege,” one of the crowd members yelled out “You got that right!” as the others cheered. Nunez continued:
“One in five don’t have health insurance in California—that’s 6 ½ million Californians out of the 37 million of us in the state. Three out of four of those who don’t have health insurance are those who work. That, my friends, is unconscionable—not just for employees, but also employers. Just in the past 5 years premiums have increased more than 73%.”
Nunez described the bill as “It’s good for business…it’s good for consumers.”
The Governor has said he will release his own plan, but only after the November election, should he be reelected. [This is reminiscent of the “new Nixon,” who those of us old enough to remember will recall, campaigned in 1968 with a “secret plan” to end the Vietnam War, only to see that conflict continue for another 5 years and through another election cycle.] His spokesperson, Sandra Demayo Lockhart, issued a statement that “His concerns are that none of the health care proposals that have been sent to his desk have addressed health care affordability.”
Senator Kuehl’s website has excellent information about Senate Bill 840 and the cost savings that will come about as a result of the bill. Approximately 25% of all health care premiums paid in this state go to health insurance carriers for administration, and the current broken system in this state involves mind numbing amounts of paperwork be filled out by health providers. Just consider the following from this site:
In California alone, we are spending a total of $186 billion dollars for healthcare this year. We know this is more than enough money to cover California’s 36 million residents with a good and comprehensive health insurance plan. How we finance this is simple – consolidate the public programs that currently account for nearly half of all health care spending, and replace the premiums, co-pays and deductibles we all pay to insurance companies with one yearly premium paid into the system.
To read more about SB 840 and universal coverage, the following is available on the web:
Cost and economic analysis The Lewin report, prepared by an independent firm with 18 years of experience in healthcare cost analysis
List of 430 organizations supporting SB 840
SB 840 as amended August 7, 2006
Still confused about single payer and want more information? Try the following site:
If you have only 5 minutes today, please take a look at the Animated Version of “What is Single Payer.” Turn on your sound and listen along with the graphics.
This is the best explanation of single payer we have seen. It should be shared with your friends and others. It is plain and simple communication about the basic concepts, and should help everyone trying to pass SB 840 in California to talk to our neighbors, friends, some of those troglodyte legislators in Sacramento, and our Governor, who just don’t get it.
There are also the following fact sheets available:
What is single payer? If you’d like to learn the basics about what all this “single-payer” talk is all about, we’ve got the answers.
How Would It Work? This section describes what a single-payer system might look like in the United States.
Compare: Compare a single-payer system to the current health care non-system.
Financing: How would we pay for all this?
