Last week, CAHU held the annual
Health Care Summit in Los Angeles, at the Universal Sheraton.
A great time was had by all at this sold out event. I want to take
this opportunity to personally thank all of the attendees, sponsors and presenters
for making a great Summit 2014.
Summit attendees were able to
take part in terrific presentations by a variety of well-respected industry
leaders, as well as a review of the legislative situation both in Sacramento
and on the November ballot. One of the highlights was a special talk by
Assembly Speaker Toni Atkins (D-San Diego) that provided insights on what
her priorities are for the Assembly to work on in 2015 and key legislative
races to watch in the upcoming election. Former state Senator Jim
Brulte, now chair of the California Republican Party, also gave a presentation
on his views of the upcoming election. It will be really
interesting to see which one was correct once the polls close on November 4.
Another popular speaker was Peter
Lee, Executive Director of Covered California and his update on what to expect
for 2014 open enrollment. Agents were able to ask a lot of questions and
get answers on some key issues “direct from the source” so to speak. We
also were lucky to have great CE presentations by CAHU leaders on a variety of
subjects critical to agent success moving forward.
If you have not ever attended a
CAHU Health Care Summit, please think about joining us next year. It
really is a special event.
I wanted to also share a note
from Alan Katz, which was sent to CAHU leadership last week. Alan is the
Co-Chair of the CAHU No on 45 Committee:
Hello,
Given all
that’s going on, I thought it time for special update on the Agents of Action
campaign against Proposition 45. Your efforts alongside your CAHU colleagues
have made all of this possible.
1. The
coalition of broker organizations (CAHU, NAIFA-California, IIABCal and WIAA)
are working together well. Between us we’ve reached thousands of brokers in person
and through webinar (plus many thousands more by email). There’s a lot of
energy being harnessed by our grassroots campaign that’s great to see and will
deliver dividends on November 4th. The response to John Nelson’s and
my presentation at the CAHU conference on Wednesday was very strong.
a. CAHU is
recording two robo-calls specifically targeted to CAHU members (Our partner
associations are doing the same). The recording should be done next week
(assuming Patrick gets over his cold). The first calls will go out soon
thereafter and second message will go out just before election day.
2. Over
1,000 brokers have pledged to get at least 40 votes to the polls. There are a
lot more who are committed to doing the same, but haven’t formally signed up on
the web site. Please continue to get brokers to make the pledge
online—this is critical to helping us follow-up to make sure they’re delivering
on their promise and to get the votes in. I have to note that the
1,000 brokers and agents that have already committed is unprecedented and
historic. Congratulations and thank you.
3. We’ve
been sending out a steady drumbeat of sample newsletter articles, Facebook
postings, Twitter tweets to CAHU members and to our partner associations that
can be used in communicating with clients. And more of these tools are on
the way. These are also posted in the resource area of the Agents of Action
website (www.AgentsOfAction.org)
if you would like to use them yourself.
4. Two
videos have been produced and are being distributed. (Their world premier was
at the CAHU convention). The first video is aimed at brokers to get them
engaged in the campaign against Proposition 45. Please post these on your
local chapter’s website. The second video explains to consumers the many
faults in Proposition 45 and brokers are encouraged to link to this video on
their web sites. You can check them out at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1PW_hf8aiw&feature=youtu.be andhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMEfSbw1fpc&feature=youtu.be.
5. Our
fundraising efforts are on track. We’ve already achieved our initial target
with more pledges still to be fulfilled. We’ll have the resources we need to
get out the vote on November 4th – and don’t forget to vote
yourself!
In closing,
it’s important to point out that we not only have the resources, people and
passion needed to win this campaign, we have the best message, too. Our message
is Proponents of Proposition 45 have a simpler message. The reality,
however, is that the more people learn about how poorly drafted, overly broad,
counter-productive, undermining of health care reform, and irresponsible the
measure is, the less support it gets.
Having said
that, be prepared. The Yes campaign will start spending their millions on
advertising soon. Their commercials will be polished and potent (which is
different than accurate and forthright). They will have an impact. Fortunately,
the broader No on 45 campaign is ready for this and so are we—in large part
thanks to your efforts and those of your fellow CAHU members.
Thank you
for all you’ve done and all you’re doing.
Alan
I want to thank Alan for his
message, and amplify a few things. First, we have a very strong campaign
going right now. But we need to keep the pedal to the metal and accelerate
through the last few weeks of the election season. People have already
started to vote, through absentee ballots. If you have not started to
activate your network of friends, family, colleges and clients, please do so.
Second, we have a great coalition
of folks supporting us, from elected officials, to virtually every major
newspaper editorial board, to a broad coalition of health care workers, labor,
and business group. So we have the resources to make this happen, but
Agents are the grass-roots effort in this campaign, and defeating Prop 45 will
not happen without each of your individual efforts.
I really want to be clear - do
not think someone else will do this for you: you have to make the effort
to ask people to vote against Prop 45. I found this out first hand last
night when I had a long conversation with my father about why he was being an
idiot about wanting to support Prop 45 (at least, I thought it was a
conversation - he thought I was yelling at him!). The ballot wording is
not accurate - the issues with the proposition are not readily apparent when
just reading the summarization on the ballot. So explain the issues and
get the support we need to stop this initiative.
Covered
California Update
Covered California had a renewal
webinar on Wednesday, October 8th. If you were not able to be on that
webinar (perhaps because you were at the CAHU Health Care Summit!) you can find
and listen to a recording of the webinar on the Covered California agent site.
There are also Medi-Cal webinars, and a host of other topics that answer
many of the Covered California questions you and your clients might have.
I encourage people to take the
time to listen to the October 8 webinar because there are some key points on
changes in the enrollment process -- mostly system refinements -- but some
really good information on product changes too. These all will be useful
to know during this open enrollment season that starts in just a few weeks on
November 15 – arghh!
Covered California also has
completed the initial phase of the residency documentation process, and have
whittled the list down to slightly more than 10,000 who still have not
submitted documentation of status. Those folks are getting a termination
notice this week - but they have until the end of October to get the
documentation to Covered California in order to have no gap in coverage, or
until the end of the year to be reinstated for coverage.
As always, please send your
comments to comments@cahu.org.
We talk with Covered California every week in order to let them know current
challenges and hurdles and questions agents have as they continue to help
Californian’s find, afford, use and maintain their health care insurance.
Patrick Burns
comments@cahu.org