Just as the development and enactment of health reform legislation was a priority for me in my first two years as Speaker, so is its successful implementation over the next two years. We in Massachusetts should never lose sight of what we, together, accomplished and how it was that we, together, got it done. Not only is our work critically important for the people of Massachusetts – it is important to the nation that is watching our every move.
I recently returned from the State Legislative Leadership Foundation and Policy Consensus Initiative at Tulane University in Louisiana, where I was among 30 state legislative leaders—senate presidents, speakers, majority leaders, and whips—representing 24 states. The title and theme of this year’s program was “Solving the Leadership Puzzle: Consensus, Communication & Vision,” and the discussions focused in part on a case study of the Massachusetts health reform law. In my presentation, I described how we achieved consensus around the Commonwealth’s comprehensive and groundbreaking legislation. Uniting the range of interests and stakeholders—many of whom contribute to this blog—was only the first of many challenges we faced in bringing affordable, accessible and quality health care to virtually every man, woman, and child in the Commonwealth. We have set high standards for Massachusetts, and we all must rise to meet those standards with the same commitment that got us to this point.
We understand that our health reform law is bold, innovative, and comprehensive. We also appreciate its place in a growing movement among states seeking to tackle the most challenging health access issues of our generation with dwindling help from the federal government. What we too often lose sight of, in the course of our hectic day to day work on many matters, is that Massachusetts health reform has revolutionized the way that the entire country considers health insurance and health security for our citizens. In fact, earlier this month, adopting Massachusetts-style reforms on a national stage were highlighted throughout a Senate Finance Committee hearing on Capitol Hill.
Whenever I gather with my counterparts from other states, we discuss the need for building consensus and overcoming the obstacle of self-interest. We discuss common goals and ways we can obtain them. And we agree that practical solutions can be found only once a fair and honest analysis of an issue is completed.
The Commonwealth’s health care reform law has become a teaching opportunity for us in our work with our colleagues from across the country. As we work every day to make this law work and to make Massachusetts a healthy place to work and live, we should keep in mind that we’ve already succeeded in advancing the national conversation about attaining health and health insurance through the cornerstone of our legislation—shared responsibility.
Salvatore DiMasi is Speaker of the House of Representatives in Massachusetts
With all due respect, as you say: “…we agree that practical solutions can be found only once a fair and honest analysis of an issue is completed.”
Just when where you planning to have this “fair and honest analysis” begin? The citizens of the state are still waiting for this to happen.
I am one of the tens of thousands of voters who, in 2003, signed the citizen petition for the health care constitutional amendment. Petition signers expected to have a fair and honest analysis of that citizen-led effort to establish a statewide guarantee of “comprehensive, affordable, equitabley financed health insurance”. Instead, you and about half of your legislative colleagues opted to break the law, defy the constitution and the State Supreme Court, and deny the citizens’ healthcare amendment its second duly required vote on its merits. Legal action is pending before the courts to remedy this travesty of justice.
As any ordinary voter will tell you, a fair and honest analysis on healthcare reform has not yet taken place. We very much look forward to it. Let us know when and where it is to begin. Perhaps each legislator could host a public forum in their district, held at a local health center or hospital.
Maybe the public forums could begin with a detailed explanation of the “shared responsibility” you seem to think is in the law. I read it and see that employers who don’t participate in providing insurance are fined $295 per worker per year, while an employee who doesn’t purchase a private insurance product could be fined $2,000 per year?
That’s “shared responsibility”???!!!
It is uncomfortable to point out but sometimes the truth hurts: in this MA reform plan there is scant evidence of “Uniting the range of interests and stakeholders”. Sadly, once again, it is corporate power broker interests that are being given priority by a Democratic legislature (that held a veto-proof majority during Romney’s tenure) over the interests and needs of the ordinary citizens and taxpayers in the Commonwealth.
Some good was done in the law (state-funded insurance for the poor and near poor) but in full balance the harm done (mandate to buy a private product sold at a profit) may well outdo the good, especially if other states or national reform look anything like this “Mitt’s MA Mandate”. What a tragic missed opportunity for real reform. Reform that could have placed ordinary people and taxpayers’ needs above corporate special interests. Reform that could have got us started in closing our >$1Billion state budget deficit.
At this writing at least 500,000 in our state remain totally uninsured while the rest of us remain either underinsured or anxiously insured as high costs continue to go through the roof. The reform plan you celebrate does practically nothing to address urgently needed cost controls.
“Health Care:Massachusetts Leading the Way”. But, we must ask, to where?
So let’s get those public forums started, and, together, we can get this thing back on track toward lasting quality affordable healthcare for all.
Dear Speaker; Please stop talking about Massachusetts leading the way. What you have put together with smoke and mirrors will not provide quality health care to everyone. Your plans with $2,000 deductible are offering people the opportunity to pay nearly $5,000 before an insurance company would have to pay for anything. I am thinking about setting up my own insurance company when I look at that opportunity.
Your law will end up being unaffordable for many people and also for the state.
Until you legislators have the guts to work on real reform and to go after the hugh administration waste, please, at least, stop pushing your farce on the the rest of the country.
To that, I’ll add that fellow states, and Congress, listen patiently–and politely–to numerous pitches during their sessions; to provide a simple audience is part of being a civil society.
It doesn’t mean they think any differently about Massachusetts history of onerous management of finances, absurd fiscal practices, ruinous tax burdens. (BTW, where’s that rollback we voted for in ‘00? That wasn’t done out of petulance; it was motivate by a popular desire to reduce the corruption of frittering spending, which now shows up in the deficit. If Howard Jarvis showed up here and passed Proposition 13, the Massachusetts legislature wouldn’t budge. Sometimes I wonder if this state’s Constitution has any meaning.)
Other states notice that, and don’t respect it.
Beware of HUBRIS, Speaker DiMasi. Thank God that Speaker DiMasi isn’t a surgeon. He wouldn’t have to test out his new surgical procedures to evaluate their success or even run clinical trials to determine their efficacy. He would just have to say it, to make it so. Well if I were he, I wouldn’t be too anxious to proclaim victory over a problem that has dogged the U.S. over the past 100 years. Let’s see if the Fat Lady Sings? We won’t know that answer to that question for years. Don’t put the cart before the horse and don’t start banging the drum before the music is written. Health care financing reform is a very difficult political and financial animal to control. Don’t just give us the sizzle show us the beef. I wonder if the odds makers in Las Vegas have determined the odds on the probable success of the health care reform initiative in the Commonwealth of MA??
Without cost control, any health care “reform” will fail as the health “industry” takes millions out in profits and excessive salaries. How can towns like Amherst and Hadley cope with increases in health care costs of 132% and 220% respectively over 7 years manage their budgets when property taxes went up only 17.5% during those years?
The oversight board running the proposed compulsory health care scheme is composed of six people, all making over $125,000 a year. There is a woman on the board who gets herself to work 4 days a week. For this she gets $165,000 a year. What do these people do that makes them worth that much?? Why does it take 6 of them? The head guy, Jon Klingsdale ($195,000) is a former exec in the health insurance industry. This is putting the fox in the hen house. How many uninsured could be brought under coverage with the combined salaries of these people?
With the deductables, healthy young people and the poor will never benefit from this scheme. All it does is take money from their pockets and put it in the coffers of the insurance companies. The result will be to further bloat the salaries of insurance executives. Why are special intersts *always* put before the interests of the people??? The legislature should repent and kill this bad idea at once!
Ferde Rombola