S.F. Restaurants Push Ahead With Challenge to Health Access Effort
The Golden Gate Restaurant Association has filed an emergency application asking the U.S. Supreme Court for a temporary restraining order barring a provision of the Healthy San Francisco program that requires employers in the city to share the cost of employees' health care, the San Francisco Chronicle reports (Knight, San Francisco Chronicle, 3/20).
Under the law that created Healthy San Francisco, employers with at least 20 workers must provide health insurance benefits, pay the city for coverage through Healthy San Francisco or contribute to health care accounts for employees.
The program also relies on funding from the city, state and fees from people enrolled in the program (California Healthline, 3/10).
Healthy San Francisco aims to provide access to health care services for all city residents but it does not constitute health insurance because it only covers services in San Francisco (California Healthline, 3/16).
GGRA maintains that the employer funding requirement violates a 1974 federal law that governs health insurance benefits (California Healthline, 3/10).
San Francisco Deputy City Attorney Vince Chhabria said he would file a response to the emergency request by March 27. Chhabria said the court could hand down a ruling the same day (San Francisco Chronicle, 3/20).
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