Chelan Advocate Discuss Health Center Funding Cliff with Congressional Leaders
Tuesday, March 24, 2015: Chelan, WA: Last week, thousands of health center advocates gathered in Washington D.C. for the National Association of Community Health Centers (NACHC) Policy and Issues Forum. Among them was a community advocate from Chelan, Columbia Valley Community Health board member Rich Watson.Watson travelled to the nation’s capital with other leaders of Columbia Valley Community Health (CVCH) including current board president Joanne Hill, CEO Patrick Bucknum and Director of Planning and Development Andy Stewart. In addition to celebrating the 50th anniversary of Community Health Centers in America, a key focus of the conference was petitioning Congress for a legislative solution to the funding cliff.
The funding cliff refers to the current law in which a major source of federal funding will expire on October 1, 2015, reducing grant funding to Community Health Centers by 70% in 2016. Leaders from CVCH and other health centers across the country have asked Congress to change the law and maintain current funding levels into the foreseeable future. If Congress does not take action, millions of low-income Americans will be left without access to primary and preventative health care. According to NACHC, bipartisan majorities in the House and Senate and more than 100 national organizations have called for action to address the health center funding cliff.
“There appears to be bi-partisan agreement that health care is a real issue and controlling health care costs is absolutely essential,” Watson said. “It seems counter-intuitive then to reduce grant funding to the most cost effective health care delivery vehicles – community health centers.
“When you consider that an alternative to medical care for uninsured and under-insured patients are emergency rooms – the highest cost delivery system – the issue of grant funding really speaks to both access and cost effectiveness. Any and everything we can do to promote access and to create communities with healthy workers supports not only a national priority, but certainly that of our local economies which our reliant upon these workers.”
Watson has served on the CVCH Board of Directors since 2006, and was nationally recognized in 2013 with the Elizabeth K. Cooke Advocacy MPV Award for his advocacy efforts generating public and political support around America’s Health Centers. The CVCH Chelan clinic is located at 317 E Johnson and offers medical, dental and behavioral health services, as well as diabetes, nutrition and WIC programs. The clinic is fully staffed with two doctors, a dentist, registered dietician and other support staff.