Viewpoints: We Need Single-Payer Legislation, Not A Piecemeal Health Package
A selection of opinions on health care developments from around the state.
Sacramento Bee:
Instead Of Single-Payer Pipe Dream, This Legislation Will Expand Health Care
The California Nurses Association claims a recent legislative package is a piecemeal approach to universal access to health care in California. This could not be further from the truth. Care4AllCA – a coalition of more than 50 consumer, community, labor, progressive and health care organizations – introduced a comprehensive approach to create a realistic pathway towards universal access. The California Medical Association supports key parts of this legislation, which unlike Senate Bill 562, include credible and far-reaching provisions to reduce costs, provide greater transparency and increase access to health care. (Theodore M. Mazer, 3/28)
Sacramento Bee:
Piecemeal Bills Will Not Fix California's Health Care
Last June, Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon unilaterally blocked public hearings, amendments and legislative votes on Senate Bill 562, a Medicare-for-all proposal that had passed the state Senate and that would guarantee health care for all Californians without ever-rising premiums, deductibles and other costs. ...But in a telling admission, lobbyists for the California Medical Association characterized these bills as giving cover to Democrats not to support single payer as proposed by the California Nurses Association. (Deborah Burger, 3/26)
Los Angeles Times:
Pit A Youth Movement For Firearms Regulation Against An Aging Gun Lobby — The Kids Will Ultimately Win
Those young people who marched for gun control all over the country showed this: The unyielding firearms lobby is in deep trouble with the next generation. No one can be sure how many marched Saturday — hundreds of thousands, millions? There were more than 800 rallies. ... It seems inevitable: Pit a growing youth movement for sensible national firearms regulation against an aging gun lobby with hardened arteries and the kids ultimately win. (George Skelton, 3/29)
Sacramento Bee:
Why Police Don't Get Charged For Shootings Like Stephon Clark's
Clark, the most recent of these victims, was killed on March 18 by two Sacramento police officers who fired 20 times at him. The officers said that they saw a gun, but all that was found was a cellphone near Clark’s dead body. We must do a better job of understanding how this happens, of preventing it from occurring, and of holding police departments and police officers accountable when tragedies take place. (Erwin Chemerinsky, 3/27)
Sacramento Bee:
A Good Investment To Keep California’s Seniors From Becoming Homeless
We are witnessing an awful reality that as California's senior population booms, so does the number of elderly and disabled adults who are abused, neglected or exploited. They often are forced into potentially life-threatening homelessness even after Adult Protective Services is alerted. Unfortunately, when APS was created two decades ago, it wasn't designed, nor was it ever funded, to deal with complicated housing issues. (Frank Mecca, 3/28)
Los Angeles Times:
Southern California Has The Resources To Solve Homelessness. It Chooses Not To
Disdain for street people is nothing new. To Marcus Tullius Cicero, homeless Romans were "the poverty-stricken scum of the city," who ought to be "drained off to the colonies." Following Huntington Beach's recent mobilization of the city's paid legal staff to oppose a county plan to house 100 homeless people near Huntington Central Park, similar coarse statements appeared in newspaper comment sections. ... When one scratches deeper into the homelessness issue, these attitudes appear not just a byproduct of the problem but also a source of it. And while the sentiment dates to Cicero — and exists in Europe, Canada, South America and elsewhere — residents in Southern California seem to shout the loudest about grime, odors and plunging housing values linked to their homeless neighbors. (Erik Skindrud, 3/27)
Sacramento Bee:
California Values All People — Until They Need Housing
Assemblymember Rob Bonta, D-Oakland, has introduced legislation, Assembly Bill 2925, that would begin to address this by requiring landlords to show “just cause” before terminating anyone’s lease. His team is still working on the language, but it would create a set of valid reasons, such as failing to pay rent, that would have to be used as justification. It's a modest bill that, if nothing else, would add a layer of transparency to what is often a murky rental process, with tenants not understanding their rights. (Erika D. Smith, 3/25)
Los Angeles Times:
It's Deceptively Called The Healthy Homes And Schools Act, And It's A Taxpayer Ripoff
What the person gathering signatures won't tell you is that the deceptively titled Healthy Homes and Schools Act is in fact a super-sneaky attempt by major paint companies to avoid paying hundreds of millions of dollars in remediation for selling people products with toxic levels of lead. (David Lazarus, 3/30)
San Francisco Chronicle:
Banning Transgender Troops Is Not The Answer
In a change from his earlier efforts to enact a ban, Trump’s new order allows the Pentagon to make exceptions allowing some transgender members to serve. The Pentagon hasn’t released official data about how many transgender people are currently serving, but a Rand Corp. study estimated that there are between 1,320 and 6,630 of transgender individuals out of a force of 1.3 million active-duty troops. (3/26)