November 17 Meeting Minutes

PNHP-MN Steering Committee Meeting
November 17, 2009
Strommen Building, St. Paul, Minnesota

1. Present: Laurel Gamm, Paul Pentel, Lindsay Byrnes, Diane Schadewald, Brian Yablon, Chirs Reif, Gillian Schivone, Elizabeth Frost, Ann Settgast, Kip Sullivan, Jim Letts

2. Upcoming events/announcements
a. U of M talk to first-year medical students, Wed Nov 18, 12:15pm, Moos Tower 1-450
b. “Hazardous to Your Health: A Series Investigating Equality and Access to Health Care” at Saint Catherine University; Jeanne d'Arc Auditorium, Whitby Hall
- Racial Disparities & Immigrant Barriers to Care – Wed Nov 18, 7pm
- Economics of Healthcare Reform – Wed Dec 9, 7pm
c. Single-payer network-building retreat hosted by UHCAN – Hospitality Place (20 minutes north of the Twin Cities). Sat Nov 21 – 9am to 6pm with sign-in /coffee/rolls at 8:30am
d. “Courageous Conversations About Health Care”, Tues Dec 1, 7 pm, White Bear Lake Unitarian Universalist Church; 328 Maple Street; Mahtomedi MN 55115 – Our member David Mair will be one of the speakers
e. Piece published in November issue of MN Medicine! 3. Discussion of national reform · PNHP's official position: "Tell the truth: the House bill will not work and is like giving aspirin to a patient with breast cancer". We need to "start from scratch" with Medicare for All. PNHP is not telling members of Congress how to vote on the legislation. Visit the PNHP website and click on “Capitol Hill Updates”.· We discussed the pros and cons of our chapter not urging a no vote on a bill that contains an insurance industry bailout, a tiny PO, and no Kucinich amendment. Kip urged us to at a minimum specify what we don’t like about this legislation in order to engage as many as possible in the realization that the current legislation is likely a “disaster in the making”. He raised his sincere concern re: pre-emption of state efforts, and specifically pointed out that an individual mandate may be the most damaging piece in this regard. Paul pointed out that it is a losing position to propose defeat of the legislation, but rather thinks we should focus on our concerns around pre-emption. · Elizabeth spoke with Dave Hage of the Strib today re: us publishing an op-ed and was given contacts for us to follow-up on. Gillian agreed to take the lead in drafting a piece which we can jointly edit. Jim suggested we start the piece positively by showcasing the good points of the bill, but then lay out the facts in order to educate the reader on why real reform is not accomplished with the legislation. Ultimately we should seek to distance ourselves from the current reform and make sure to avoid confusion that this is actually what single-payer advocates are calling for.· Please see the attached handout with thoughts or talking points on HR 3692· Senator Bernie Sanders will be introducing wording on the Senate side similar to the Kucinich amendment, and it is paramount that we work to support this. Our chapter will work with MUHCC & GMHCC to meet with Senators Franken & Klobuchar on this. To hear Senator Sander’s comments, please visit: http://aiss.enews.senate.gov/t/83494/4466220/2225/0/
4. Target legislator work for the MHP in the 2010 legislative session. We reviewed our list of 13 targeted legislators who sit on committees that will be hearing the MN bill this session. We have two legislators (Jim Vickerman and Julie Bunn) who represent districts in which we have no members. Several present at the meeting indicated they would be willing to do meetinss with these legislators. For those districts in which we do have members, assignments are as follows.
a. Laurel – will be arranging meetings with our members and Senators Ann Rest & Don Betzold
b. Kip – will be contacting our 8 members in Rep. Steve Simon’s district
b. Dave – is in the process of contacting members to meet with Reps. Paul Gardner and Kim Norton
c. Jim – is in the process of contacting members in Senator Katie Sieben’s district
d. Elizabeth – has already made progress on meeting with Rep. Kate Knuth and will be working on Reps. Leon Lillie and Larry Hosch
e. Ann – is in the process of contacting our 13 members in Rep. Tom Huntley’s district

5. Messaging regarding the MHP – Jim reviewed an event held at MUHCC executive director, Amy Lange’s house. We reviewed the video from the House committee hearing last session at which the bill was tabled. We are working to develop strategy to prepare good responses for opposition arguments against the MHP. Jim presented the example of discussion around rationing. Please see the attached document for his articulate response to this concern. Another way to address the concern is to point out that single-payer systems save money by eliminating administrative waste, NOT by denying care. Period.

6. Financial update – treasury: ~ $3000. No planned expenditures at present other than MUHCC annual dues of $250.

7. Outreach to pediatricians – Lyndsay volunteered to investigate possibilities for tabling or presenting to the MN chapter of the AAP. Jim pointed out that tabling this spring at the MAFP spring refresher was one of the best ways we have spent money in terms of adding signers to our resolution. Laurel will be organizing this again and will investigate further the possibility of a single-payer presentation at this meeting in 2010.

8. Website – we agreed to keep our site minimal as there is no need to duplicate the wealth of info present on the national site. However, ideas were suggested such as providing an easier link to the national site and adding a “next meeting” button on the front page. Elizabeth & Ann are updating the “About Us” statement on the home page.

9. Next meeting & speakers training – there is lot of interest in holding a 4-hour training to help prepare members to feel more comfortable presenting the single-payer case to audiences. We are tentatively looking at two Saturdays, 1/9 & 1/16. Please contact us with your interest in attending and your availability for either of these dates.