.
And also, like, what the fuck? Is this what you voted these guys in for?
Nelson, Bates, Moorlach. "We've GOT great health coverage. We've got money. We're Republicans. We want Obama out. DUH. Do the math! What is WRONG with you people?"
I sat down to write this piece, having been alerted that three of our five Republican Supes had blocked our OC Health Care Agency (HCA) from applying for $10 million in available grants from the Feds. Then I quickly discovered that the Liberal OC’s Prevatt already did the heavy lifting on this two days ago. That’s fine. But I can spare you Chris’ dense bureaucratese and insufficient outrage.
Obamacare was passed by Congress in 2010. Some of us like it, some of us don’t, and if some have their way it’ll be repealed next year, but for now it’s the law of the land, and it’s paid for with our tax dollars. And it provides millions of dollars in grants for preventive care programs across the nation, programs which have been shown scientifically to save MUCH MUCH MORE in illness-care than they cost. Remember how your grandpa used to say, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure?” He said that because it was true.
So our own OC HCA, no political hacks but professionals tasked with improving the health and reducing the costs of care for this County, applied for one of those grants – a $40,000 one to “model worksite wellness policy… [to] be piloted at HCA creating tool kits and disseminating lessons learned to other governmental worksites.”
Here I want to give a big shout-out to the whole idea of preventive care, which can be thought of as subversive to the medical-industrial establishment. No doctors get rich off it, no hospitals or medical supply manufacturers get rich off it, no big pharmaceutical companies get rich off it. Republicans, who are allegedly “conservative,” should celebrate preventive care as a proven way to rein in unnecessary spending down the road by government, businesses, and individuals.
But the Board majority, having final authority over what our HCA can apply for from the Feds, nixed their request. This comes on the heels of their rejection of a much bigger program last year – a $10 million ($2 million a year over 5 years) grant to “to support community activities that prevent chronic diseases and reduce health consequences of chronic diseases such as cardio vascular disease, stroke and respiratory diseases.”
And what is these Supervisors’ stated reason for rejecting these millions of dollars in available, preventive healthcare funds? BARACK OBAMA is the reason. Obamacare, as they call it (as do I, having no objection to the catchy moniker.) As Board Chairman Moorlach put it, “I’m taking the posture that if it’s anything to do with, I’ll use the term ObamaCare, I’m going to be a ‘no’.”
The Register‘s utterly un-brilliant Brian Calle (pictured to the right as “Salacious Crumb,” court jester of Jabba the Hut) immediately cheered on the Board’s politicized move as “a bold decision that more local elected officials throughout the state and country should emulate. It sends a message to President Barack Obama and his administration: We do not want nationalized health care, and we will not help implement it.” (Of course Obamacare is nothing like nationalized health care, but I wouldn’t expect the callow Calle to understand that.)
If these Republican politicians want to defeat Obama’s health care reform, they should focus on defeating Obama in the ballot box and/or in court, not by yanking its paid-for benefits from the very citizens they’re supposed to be serving. As Prevatt points out, the BOS majority is utterly failing in its stated mission of:
“Making Orange County a safe, healthy, and fulfilling place to live, work, and play, today and for generations to come, by providing outstanding, cost-effective regional public services.”
I’ve got no brief for any of these OC Supervisors, and we give Bill Campbell and Janet Nguyen a lot of grief here, but they did the right, pragmatic thing this time, dissenting from the majority. We know that Shawn Nelson and John Moorlach are hard-right ideologues, and partisan warriors – especially Moorlach. What about Pat Bates though? I’d thought she was more reasonable. Can any of her constituents out there call her? Can there be a re-vote on this?
After talking to Shawn Nelson
In contrast with Moorlach, who made it clear that his prime motivator is nobly just saying NO to Obamacare, hoping that if enough localities do that it will just go away as unwanted and unnecessary, Shawn (my cousin from another coven) claims that while he’s no fan of Obamacare, it’s not a “litmus test” to him, and he doesn’t rule out requesting Obamacare money in the future (assuming it survives court challenges and the 2012 election.) He just thinks that the particular program HCA was wanting funded was STOOPID and unnecessary.
According to Shawn, the program mostly consisted of telling high school kids that secondhand smoke is dangerous, and that a sedentary lifestyle with Cheetos diet will wear on your health after a while – a program to teach kids things they ALL ALREADY KNOW while giving stoopid bureaucrats a chance to pad their resumes and justify their miserable existences.
Hm. This is not what the program was at all, according to Prevatt’s article. It was about “workplace wellness.” I’m going to have to look into this discrepancy and figure out just WHO is blowing smoke here! I asked Shawn about the rejected $10 million request from June 2011, and he couldn’t remember what that was about – “Sort of…the same thing, I think.” Does he just not pay attention to what programs he’s rejecting? I’ll update this tomorrow after I investigate further.
Shawn says what kids need is NOT one more program telling them things they already know, but MORE EXERCISE, and less little paper slips excusing fat kids from running laps. At the very moment we were speaking, he told me he was busily ferrying a batch of kids to football practice. “What we should be putting money into is more P.E. programs!” Well then! What if Shawn got together with the decision makers at HCA and brought his ideas to them – seeing as how he’s not above requesting Obamacare money after all, maybe the grants could instead be for more exercise programs that also include that education component?
For now, other counties, other states, are going to be getting these millions of dollars, which are TRYING to come to the OC and keep getting chased away by Moorlach, Nelson and Bates!
Idealogues…….hmmm. The so-called Devil in the Details concept….may be a partial logical response…..but what normally happens is that there are plenty of other counties, large cities and actively engaged lobbyist with nothing better to do than make their 20% finding Federal Cash for various communities. How many jobs could the $10 million dollars have supported for how long? We can wait and watch and by next year figure out the wisdom in their decision.
This is a lot of money to reject no matter which county in California. I really question the BOS and this decision to send back taxpayer dollars, which may have originated in the OC. How many other times have these “leaders and decision makers” sent back money from taxpayers to support local programs. Has the county returned public safety dollars? Probably not. I question the BOS’s thinking, not really. We know the answer.
This is but another chapter in decades and decades of the OC Supervisors rejecting federal dollars for various reasons, mostly out of a stated fear that big brother in DC will be gaining authority over local decision making by accepting such dollars. Mental Health funding was declined back in the 70’s, then Federal Revenue Sharing, etc.
Much effort has been spent by Supervisors and County government more recently decrying the lack of equity that OC does not get its fair share of various state and federal funding streams, some of which was really crying about the long term consequences of these past Supervisor decisions. Nothing has changed – politics remains about the now, not the future..
Thanks for the history, oldtimer! Between you and the Winships, we may not be “condemned to repeat” all of it.
Now Vern, being long lost cousins and all and given the fact that you serenaded my entire law office staff at our christmas party I am always happy to chat. I do have to remind you that Pat and I do not accept a pension from the county.
Sorry I was unable to instantly recall the specifics of an agenda item I voted on last June while driving with a car full of kids. If I can get a tad more advance notice next time than none I promise to give more depth to my answer.
Keep asking the hard questions.
Shawn
Okay, maybe that paragraph was unclear. What it seemed like was this:
When I asked you what you had against the program that you JUST REJECTED a couple weeks ago, you replied NOT with a caricatured description of the program you rejected a couple weeks ago, but a caricatured description of the program you rejected last June.
That’s what makes it seem like, with all due respect, you just saw HCA coming and said “Oh these idjits again. I’m-a say NO again.”
This is important, since your stated reason for opposing the proposal was not, as with Moorlach, a crusade against Obamacare, but rather a disdain for the actual proposal.
How about that idea I suggested at the end, where you suggest a BETTER program to HCA, that includes excercise AND education, that you would support funding for?
And everybody, let’s hear it for Supervisor Shawn Nelson, the only OC elected with the guts to jump into the county’s “political mosh pit!”
May I ask an easy question, then? Why did you vote no on this proposal?
Well, until Shawn gets back – like I wrote in the article, he thinks the program proposed by HCA was lame and unnecessary. Although I have reason to doubt he studied it very closely, as what he described to me seemed to be another program from last year.
Also – I didn’t put this in my article – but he and Moorlach (and Bates?) feel that there is way too much wasteful spending in the country, and if more and more municipalities follow OC’s lead in rejecting the offer of free goodies from the Feds, the Feds will eventually stop offering so many free goodies, and be forced to cut spending and borrowing. Shawn puts no truck in the argument that “if we don’t get it some other locality will,” as Janet says.
Well *I* want our share of healthcare money, especially preventive healthcare money – although I’m open to the idea that maybe better programs could be proposed than the ones HCA has come up with so far. I don’t know. This is still something to be looked into.
My bet is that the explanation is that no one that they feel they actually represent will be hurt by this. It’s like someone with an entirely vegan voting base rejecting subsidies for cheese and chicken enchiladas.
Maybe if the Supes would stop dumping no longer useful political appointees into the HCA bureaucracy, they would come up with better grant proposals.
Please elaborate. Name one political appointee in the HCA bureaucracy.
So. I was just having cheesy grits with Quimby, and passed along this question to him, Tony. Sometimes he goes for DAYS without checking out the blog, the eccentric old coot.
And he quickly spat back the names “Eric Norby. John Collins. Lots. I could go on.” I’d dodged the bullet of grit spittle, and thankfully he swallowed before he continued.
“Yeah, some of these programs HCA may come up with could no doubt use some improvement, but not at the expense of turning down Federal money for our county. This is JOBS we’re talking about, jobs and health.”
Never heard of John Collins. Eric Norby left the County years ago.
John Collins. Moorlach’s old Chief of Staff I think?
BTW, “political appointees” at the County are “at-will” and are categorized as Executive Assistants.
People employed in agencies at the behest of politicians – like Matt Harper – aren’t political appointees.
Nope. That was my old pal Mario Maneiro.
Could Moorlach have had more than one CoS at various times?
He’s on his third. None named John Collins.
“applied for one of those grants – a $40,000 one to “model worksite wellness policy… [to] be piloted at HCA creating tool kits and disseminating lessons learned to other governmental worksites”
Sorry, but shouldn’t that be OSHA’s (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) job? or maybe even couldn’t it be OSHA’s department?
I am glad this was turned down because it seems frivolous and redundant.
How about some preventative care people can use and not specifically for workplace since at this time our unemployment rate seems to be high. Why not a preventative program for the unemployed as they probably need it the most. Specifically, How about for the families that lost their jobs and house that are trying to make it? Couldn’t they use a preventative care program?
Not to detract from the point of this post, but it’s worth noting that THREE OTHER MANAGERS refused the HCA interm chief job before they “named” chief shrink Mark Refowitz to the gig.
This is one fucked up agency. Maybe holding back the funds was a noble thought, considering the history of employee abuses and mismanagement there.
Besides, $10 M is a drop in the bucket if they screened applicants better (not by race, but by need). This is an agency which throws a lot of money at proplems but solves few.
In a thirty year study, I wonder how much real good the HCA really did?
Refowitz was forced on the Board by Janet Nguyen.
Oops, gotta go. Fullerton is calling!
Tell Fullerton that you already gave at the office.
BWAAA-hahahahaha. I crack myself up.
I read on-line this morning that the Fed’s have told Texas the State will be ineligible for any federal health funds because of a policy that the State will not provide funds to any clinics that, besides providing health care, also provide abortion services. Could this be Orange County’s future – no Medi-Cal funding for Orange County’s residents?
Yeah these Supes wanna turn OC into Texas. They probably sent Chuck DeVore out there to take notes.
Moorlach no want Obamacare!