SACRAMENTO—Co-chairs Assemblymembers Jim Wood, DDS (D-Healdsburg), and Joaquin Arambula, MD (D-Fresno), announce the third in a series of hearings of the Select Committee on Health Care Delivery Systems and Universal Coverage to be held January 17 in Sacramento at the State Capitol, Room 4202. The hearing is scheduled to begin at 1 p.m. and will be televised on the California Channel at www.calchannel.com.
“We have spent more than 20 hours in these hearings learning from health care experts,” said Wood. “Those hours, in addition to the time we will spend during the next meetings, will far exceed the attention this important issue would have received at a single policy hearing of the Assembly Health Committee, and I make no apologies for that. We have the responsibility to make sure that the recommendations we publish this spring can provide the pathway to a health care solution for everyone who calls California home.”
The January 17 hearing will focus on access to care and understanding health care pricing. Speakers will include Chris Perrone, Director of Improving Access at the California Health Care Foundation; Laurence Baker, Professor of Health Research and Policy, Stanford University; and Larry Levitt, Co-Executive Director of the Program for the Study of Health Reform and Private Insurance, Kaiser Family Foundation. Other speakers and the agenda, once confirmed, will be posted at the select committee’s website, http://healthcare.assembly.ca.gov/content/2017-2018-hearings.
“Health care is an issue of social justice and we need to make sure that we are not only providing coverage, but ensuring access to care,” said Arambula. “We remain committed to figuring out how to achieve universal health care in California.”
“Once these meetings have addressed the key issues, we will publish our recommendations in the spring,” said Wood. “Our goal has always been to address the information and policy gaps needed to provide a successful pathway to health care for all.”
The select committee was created in March by Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon, with Wood and Arambula as co-chairs. Other committee members appointed include Assemblymembers Autumn Burke (D-Inglewood), David Chiu (D-San Francisco), Laura Friedman (D-Glendale), Tom Lackey (R-Palmdale) and Marie Waldron (R-Escondido).