LETTER TO BOARD OF SUPERVISORS

June 12, 2001

Scott Haggerty, President
Board of Supervisors
1221 Oak St.
Oakland, CA 94612

Dear President Haggerty:

Since its inception in 1984, Vote Health, a community organization based in Alameda County, has devoted much of our organizational energy and resources to advocating for the needs of the Medical Center.

It has long been the position of Vote Health that the County is ultimately fiscally and morally responsible for ensuring that the Medical Center continue to provide quality medical services for our indigent and underinsured population, despite the recent transfer of power to the Trustees. When the Medical Center is in need of financial help, whether it be for capital needs, budget deficits or enhancement of services, the County should do everything in its power to meet those needs. We have prepared two position papers to demonstrate why there are compelling reasons to fund two specific requests:

1. The Neuro-Respiratory Unit at Fairmont Hospital
   
2. The Specialty Clinics in the ACMC system

Fortunately the Alliance has voted to allocate $7.7 million to the ACMC to make up most of its 2002 deficit. We ask that the County allocate the $5 million outlined in the two position papers, to be adjusted if the Alliance votes to give the ACMC additional funds.

Vote Health also requests that the County direct that the ACMC be fully reimbursed for services rendered to other County departments. The Juvenile Hall clinic is currently under-reimbursed by approximately $500,000, and John George Pavilion is losing more than $3 million per year because the County is not forwarding the full $750 per patient day billed to the state for some 80 Behavioral Care patients.

We note that other County departments have been allocated budget increases which are much higher than the 5% COLA recommended by the CAO for the ACMC. The overall increase according to the CAO's budget is 12%. Increases for other departments include 14% for General Government, 16% to the Courts, and so on. If the ACMC received just the average 12% increase, the requests that Vote Health is making could be fully funded. In order for the Medical Center to keep pace with additional costs that are outside of its ability to control, the County must recognize that it also needs larger yearly increases than have been budgeted so far.

We are believe that these issues should be County priorities because they could mean life or death for many residents of our county.

Sincerely,
Nancy M. Friedman, Chair

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