Campaign Update
Thursday, April 26, 2007

Children's Coverage Bills Pass Health Committees

Californians for Healthy Kids is excited to report that both AB 1 (Laird & Dymally) and SB 32 (Steinberg) passed out of their respective Assembly and Senate Health Committees this week. As you know, these identical bills would finish the job of providing access to affordable, comprehensive health insurance to all of California's children as well as ease the enrollment process to help keep children covered for as long as they are eligible.

Testimony in support of AB 1 and SB 32 underscored why any meaningful healthcare reform must include covering all kids and must be accomplished this year. At the Assembly Health hearing, co-author Assemblyman John Laird stated emphatically that “insuring every child in California is a logical and important first step in the effort underway to reform California's healthcare system.” Additionally, Katy Boriack of Santa Cruz spoke to the difference that health insurance has made in the life of her 2-year-old son, and business owner Lindsay Austin testified to the importance of children's coverage for employee productivity and retention.

During the Senate Health hearing, author Senator Darrell Steinberg stressed the importance of covering all kids this year. Judy Darnell of United Way's Covering California's Children described the strong majority of Californians – including business leaders, children's and healthcare advocates, and educators – that support children's insurance, and Honey Arenas, a Certified Application Assistor at the Solano Kids Insurance Program, shared stories about children who are now pain-free and succeeding in school because they are insured and getting the health care they need. For more information on the hearings, please see our press release.

We offer our thanks to the following legislators who voted in support of the bills this week:

If you would like to thank these legislators for their support of children's health insurance, you can find Assembly contact information here and Senate information here, or call us for help.

We also extend our thanks to YOU – the many children's coverage allies who wrote support letters and attended the hearings. The bills now move to their respective Appropriations Committees for consideration of fiscal impact. We will send an update when hearings are scheduled

As always, thank you for your efforts to help give every child a healthy start! Please call Alani Cridge Navarro at 916-443-1869 with questions.

The 100% Campaign, a collaborative effort of Children Now, Children's Defense Fund and The Children's Partnership, was created to ensure that all of California's children obtain the health insurance they need to grow up strong and healthy.
www.100percentcampaign.org

The PICO California Project is the united effort of 20 California congregation-community organizations affiliated with the PICO National Network. Collectively, we represent 350 congregations and 400,000 families statewide and are actively organizing in over 70 cities in Northern and Southern California.
www.picocalifornia.org