Tour Touting Universal Health Care Lands in Oxnard
A year-long campaign stumping for universal health care and legislation to create a single-payer health care system stopped in Oxnard on Monday as it continues through the state, the Ventura County Star reports.
Health Care for All-California is sponsoring the OneCareNow campaign, which has been traveling to a different city in California each day since its Aug. 12, 2006, kickoff in Morro Bay. The tour is slated to wrap up in Los Angeles on Aug. 11.
Sen. Sheila Kuehl (D-Los Angeles) said the tour has built support for SB 840, a measure she is carrying in the Legislature that would create a state-run, single-payer health care system in California.
The bill is making its way through legislative committees, but Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) is expected to veto the measure if it wins legislative approval.
However, Kuehl said she believes the tour has created "plenty of momentum to carry the bill through to next year and even to the next governor."
Andrew McGuire, executive director of Health Care for All, said the tour has collected 40,000 signatures in favor of its goals and helped win support from the California School Employees Association and other groups. He said plans are in the works to launch another campaign next year (Klampe, Ventura County Star, 7/24).