Health Care Reform History

Background

The Vermont Campaign for Health Care Security Education Fund is the sister organization to the Vermont Campaign for Health Care Security (The Campaign). The Campaign was formed in the Fall, 2005 after several organizations met to discuss concerted action to advance health care reform after organized labor and the advocacy community failed to respond adequately to the Governor’s veto in 2005 of H.524, a reform bill that would have moved Vermont incrementally toward a publicly financed system of health care.

Coalition Building

The Campaign initially started as VPIRG, Vermont-NEA, AARP-VT and the Vermont State Employees Association. In late November 2005 funding was secured from the Vermont-NEA to hire Peter Sterling as a 20 hour a week campaign organizer. Peter’s first action was to broaden and diversify the Campaign to bring the wide range of voices to the table who are being hurt by the health care crisis.

Peter aggressively recruited groups representing farmers, loggers, minority rights groups, the faith community, local citizen activists, nurse practioners, retirees and more. By January 1, 2006 the Campaign had 23 groups representing almost one third of Vermont’s population. This was the largest coalition ever formed in Vermont around advancing legislation.

From the beginning, the Campaign aspired to provide “a single, unified voice to those citizens who are seeking reforms to lift the crushing burden of health care costs from the backs of Vermonters and their employers,” and to achieving fundamental and systemic changes to the way health care is financed, regulated and delivered. Campaign members coalesced around 5 principles:

• Health care must be available and affordable to each Vermonter from birth to death.
  
  
• There must be no discrimination or barriers to affordable health care.
  
  
• What Vermont spends on health care must be adequate, sustainable and paid for by spreading the cost fairly across the population.
  
  
• Individual health care costs must not exceed anyone’s ability to pay, and no one must pay more because he or she is sick.
  
  
• We must always seek ways to improve the safety and quality of health care.

Prior to the beginning of the legislative session, the Campaign decided to focus its mobilization efforts and communications on the issue of affordability and the impact of the health care crisis on the lives and livelihoods of Vermonters.

The Campaign publicly announced its existence and mission in a kick-off press conference organized by Peter on January 10 2006, at the Vermont Statehouse. It was facilitated by Jen Henry, a nurse and union leader, and featured a panel of Vermonters—an independent carpenter, a small business owner, a retired person, a farmer and a nurse—all of whom spoke plainly, but eloquently, about what it means not to have access to affordable health care. Their message was delivered at the Statehouse before a large crowd of media, public spectators, and elected representatives catapulted the Campaign into the public eye, and sent a clear, unambiguous message to the governor and Legislature: do something now about health care reform. “The Time Is Now” was the theme of the event, underscored by the presence of several clocks in the front of the room, and by the Campaign’s principles prominently displayed on a large poster board.

January 31st

The Campaign held its second major media event involving five of Vermonter’s seven mayors. The “Mayor’s Press Conference,” the first of its kind in the state, drove home the impact of the health care affordability crisis on Vermont’s cities, budgets, taxpayers and municipal workers.

February 12th

The House Health Care Committee passes H.861, the Health Care Affordability Act, which includes the Catamount Health Plan and a bold new chronic care initiative. On March 3rd the Vermont House of Representatives overwhelmingly passes the Health Care Affordability Act.

March 22nd

The Campaign begins the first flight of statewide two-week radio ad campaign begins. It is the largest issue ad campaign ad of the 2006 legislative session.

March 28th

Senate President Pro Tem Peter Welch tells the press he favors a Massachusetts-style “individual mandate.” Subsequently, the mandate appears in the Senate version of the reform bill. On March 29th, members of the Campaign’s Steering Committee meet with Senator Welch to press its case for removing the “individual mandate” from Catamount. Campaign spokespeople are persuasive: it is removed.

April 13th

The Health Care Affordability Act passes the Vermont Senate, 25-4, with 5 of 9 Senate Republicans voting yes. (The Campaign had conducted phone banking targeting key Republicans.)

April 19th

The Campaign’s second flight of radio ads is produced: the message is aimed specifically at the Governor: sign H.861.

April 26th

In response to negative statements by Governor Douglas’ staff, Campaign’s pro-reform op-ed runs in the Rutland Herald, the state’s second largest daily.

April 27th

The Campaign’s fourth major press event is held in collaboration with Campaign member group Vermont Interfaith Action, brought several religious leaders to the Statehouse to urge Governor Douglas to sign H.861 and to call attention to the profound moral and ethical issues raised by the lack of affordable health care. The event included the reading of a statement by the Bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Vermont. This was a powerful and moving event, and its timing was propitious: it occurred as the governor was being aggressively vocal about possibly vetoing H.861.

That same day Campaign members from Vermont-NEA and AARP Vermont met with the editorial board writers of the Rutland Herald and the Burlington Free Press with the same basic message, and to articulate more specifically and forcefully the benefits of H.861.

May 3rd

The Health Care Affordability Act is voted out of Conference Committee.

May 4th

The Conference version of reform bill passes Senate 20-4. Five of nine Republicans break ranks with the governor and sign the bill.

May 8th

The WCAX news division (the most watched television news channel in the state) releases a poll that shows the governor’s unfavorable ratings had risen dramatically since the last poll.

May 9, 2006

Governor Jim Douglas agrees to sign the Health Care Affordability Act.

May 25, 2006

H.861—the Health Care Affordability Act—is signed into law.