• Democrat super-majority lawmakers mull universal health care coverage
• If bill passes, it’ll likely become a ballot measure
Paul ShukovskySeattleStaff CorrespondentFawn JohnsonWashingtonEditorDozens of majority Democrat lawmakers in Oregon have taken the first step toward the design and implementation of a universal healthcare coverage program that could face final approval by the electorate in a ballot measure.
Senate Bill 770, introduced Feb. 12, outlines the broad parameters of what universal healthcare in Oregon would look like and would set up a board to research, implement and provide oversight of the Health Care for All Oregon Plan.
The measure has 39 sponsors so far including the majority leaders of the Senate and the House. With Democrat supermajorities in both chambers and a Democrat in the governor’s mansion, no Republican support is required to pass the bill.
“We are in a position now where we can move this bill forward,” prime
co-sponsor Sen. James Manning Jr. (D) told Bloomberg Law.
The plan would be administered by the Oregon Health Authority and would provide “universal access to comprehensive care” to everyone--without exception--living or working in Oregon, according to the bill. It would mean cradle-to-grave integrated coverage of physical, dental, vision, and mental health care.
Among its sweeping provisions, implementation of the plan would supplant coverage by private insurers and repeal the state’s Obamacare exchange. Regional Planning Boards would oversee allocation of health resources.
“We’re in a different political environment now,” Sen. Michael Dembrow (D) told Bloomberg Law Feb. 13. “In the last year or two, a lot of people are talking about Medicare for all,” said Dembrow, who has long led efforts in prior sessions to move toward universal health care administered by the state.
Can the bill pass? “I think it would be hard for it to pass in the
Legislature other than as a referral to the voters,” Dembrow said. “I think that
is what you will ultimately see with this bill.”
Dembrow identified key backers of the bill as Health Care for All Oregon, whose board is composed largely of social-justice and organized labor activists, some of whom are healthcare professionals.
“We would expect a referral to the people by the Legislature,” Health Care for All Oregon President Tom Sincic told Bloomberg Law in a Feb. 13 telephone interview. “If the Legislature doesn’t have the political will to do this, then we will put it on the ballot. It’s what the vast majority of Oregonians want.”
Dembrow said lawmakers would like to avoid ceding control over the measure by failing to pass it.
“I think we would want this to be something that is done proactively: We have the bill we want and we refer it to the voters,” Dembrow said. “We would have more control over the actual election in which it would happen. What makes the most sense would be a presidential year with a larger turnout and an electorate that would be more sympathetic to universal health care.
To contact the reporter on this story: Paul Shukovsky in Seattle at pshukovsky@bloomberglaw.com
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Fawn Johnson at fjohnson@bloomberglaw.com
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