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Sacramento Bee
By Clea Benson
June 20, 2006
Democrats are dropping a proposal to extend state health
insurance programs to all California children, including
undocumented immigrants, a key stumbling block in negotiations
over a state budget, Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata
said Monday.
But Republicans said they still wouldn't vote for the
$131 billion spending plan because it also includes $23
million that GOP Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger put in to
shore up existing county health programs covering children
who are in the United States illegally.
Perata's announcement at a Sacramento Press Club lunch
came days after lawmakers missed their June 15 deadline
for approving a state budget for the fiscal year that
begins July 1.
"We did not want the budget to become hung up on
that particular point," said Perata, D-Oakland. "This
is about children. They should not be a chess piece in
this game."
The Democrats' change of heart leaves the governor
aligned with them but on the opposite side of the issue
from members of his own party.
Republican leaders say any funding of programs for
undocumented children will encourage illegal immigration.
The governor last week spoke out in favor of insuring
undocumented children, saying, "Every child should
have the right to some health care."
He opposed Democrats' insurance expansion plan on the
grounds that it was too expensive.
Senate Republican leader Dick Ackerman of Irvine called
Perata's announcement Monday "a step in the right
direction, but we also need to deal with the $23 million
that the governor put in."
Assembly Speaker Fabian Núñez, D-Los
Angeles, and Assembly Republican leader George Plescia
of La Jolla said through their spokesmen that they had
no comment.
H.D. Palmer, a spokesman for Schwarzenegger's Department
of Finance, said there were still many areas of the budget
on which the governor and his fellow Republicans were
united in their disagreement with Democrats.
"There are differences on the issue of the education
budget, and there are differences in terms of public
safety measures," Palmer said.
Republicans want some funds for education earmarked
for specific programs, while Democrats want schools to
get block grants that they can spend as they wish. And
Republicans want to restore about $150 million for law
enforcement that Democrats took out of the governor's
proposed spending plan.
But no part of the budget has generated as much debate
as the efforts to expand health insurance for children,
a popular issue among California voters, according to
polls.
The governor's proposal would eliminate the waiting
lists for existing programs in 18 counties that aim to
provide health insurance for all children. Those efforts,
usually called Healthy Kids programs, are run by coalitions
of local organizations, not by the counties. Most do
receive some public funding from the state tax on tobacco.
The Healthy Kids programs also receive private funds
from philanthropies and businesses that are providing
seed money in an attempt to show that universal insurance
for children is a beneficial public policy. But the programs
don't have enough funds to pay the $1,000 annual cost
of insuring every eligible child, so many have waiting
lists.
The theory is that providing health care to all children
helps limit the spread of infectious illnesses and cuts
the public cost of providing emergency care.
The UCLA Center for Health Policy Research estimates
that about 800,000 children statewide don't have health
insurance. Of those, about 150,000 are undocumented.
"The bottom line here is that all kids get sick
regardless of their immigration status," said Wendy
Lazarus of the Children's Partnership, one of the groups
involved in the effort. "Counties realize it makes
more fiscal sense to provide kids with basic health care
than to force them into emergency rooms, the most expensive
form of care."
Emergency rooms are legally required to treat all patients
in need of urgent medical attention, regardless of whether
they have insurance or are legal residents.
Some Republican-leaning areas of the state, such as
San Bernardino and Riverside counties, have Healthy Kids
programs that cover all children. In some cases, private
funds are earmarked to cover undocumented children to
avoid a controversy over immigration status.
But proponents have intended all along to create a
model that will some day be taken over by the public
sector, said Dr. Robert Ross, president of the California
Endowment, a philanthropic organization that has been
funding the 18 existing Healthy Kids programs.
"You've had a fair amount of private fundraising
that has been engineered with the intent that one day
the state would step up to the table with some resources
to sustain these programs," Ross said. "It
appears we are inching ever closer to that reality."
Ackerman and other Republicans have said they oppose
all efforts to provide health care to undocumented immigrants
because it provides more incentive to come to the country
illegally.
Perata said Monday that lawmakers would try later this
year to enact legislation expanding children's insurance
statewide, which could cost about $300 million a year.
Supporters of universal insurance for children aren't
waiting for lawmakers to act. An initiative on the ballot
in November would add a $2.60 per pack tax on cigarettes
to pay for a variety of health programs, including children's
insurance.
Lawmakers say they will be watching to see what happens
with the initiative.
"That's the reason why people should take a deep
breath," Perata said. "This is becoming more
philosophical than it is pragmatic, because if (the initiative)
passes, it changes the world."
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