In late December, COPA leaders celebrated the unanimous decision by the Monterey County Board of Supervisors to invest nearly $5 million in a six-month Community Outreach & Education pilot program targeting neighborhoods hardest hit by COVID-19. This program will hire 100 community health workers -- trusted people from community-based organizations -- starting January 1, 2021. These trained workers will help educate families, as well as connect people who test positive with needed services, including temporary housing for quarantine or isolation, cash assistance, food, medical care and information about employment rights.  Workers will target the hardest hit Census tracts. 

The program proposal, created by COPA’s “Breaking the Chain” team, was based on more than 2,000 conversations with Monterey County families impacted by COVID-19, and is similar to other programs in California.  In the midst of the pandemic, leaders from COPA’s 28 member institutions launched a listening campaign in which they heard stories about the need for rental assistance; access to testing, tracing, and supported isolation; and access to education and distance learning resources.

Allies spoke in support of the proposal including Building Healthy Communities, Center for Community Advocacy, California Rural Legal Assistance, the Monterey County Farm Bureau, Catholic Diocese of Monterey and the Hospitality Industry Association.

Monterey County Board of Supervisors Approves Nearly $5 Million for COVID-19 Program, The Californian [pdf]

Monterey County Supervisors Approve Pilot Project to Help Those Disproportionately Impacted by COVID-19, KION [pdf]

Supervisors Approve Nearly $5 Million to Put Trusted Health Workers into Neighborhoods Suffering Under Covid, Monterey County Weekly [pdf]

County Supervisors to Consider $2.3 Million to Fund Pilot Program Targeting Neighborhoods Hit Hardest by Covid, Monterey County [pdf]

COPA Press Release

[Excerpt]

What started out in 2015 as a $500,000 pilot from Monterey County became a bonafide $2 million health initiative to cover the uninsured in 2017. Esperanza Care gives basic healthcare to undocumented residents who are not covered by state or federal subsidized insurance, and was renewed by the&nbsp Board of Supervisors in the 2020-2021 county budget. Esperanza Care came about thanks to efforts of community groups like the local branch of Community Organized for Relational Power in Action (COPA).

COPA leader María Elena Manzo  says that Esperanza Care came out of the county trying to fill a major hole in Medi-Cal, and relentless advocacy work:

“We have it because we kept showing up. [The county supervisors] couldn’t ignore us,”

she says. Esperanza Care costs $2 million annually.

The Buzz 07.16.20, Monterey Weekly

President Obama plans to meet with Dallas Area Interfaith at Temple Emanu-El, where hundreds of institutional leaders gathered last month to launch their institutional enrollment outreach strategy. Chair of the DAI Healthcare Committee Gwen Lummus explained to the Dallas Morning News that "this area had the highest percentage of uninsured in the whole country. That's one of the reasons we've been working on this."

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Three hundred leaders from Dallas Area Interfaith assembled at Temple Emmanu-El in North Dallas to kick off an affordable care campaign aimed at explaining the federal healthcare exchange. Marjorie Petty, Region 6 Director of US Health & Human Services, praised DAI, asserting they "have done an amazing amount of work in just six weeks" and is "a model for others around the country."

With the aid of multi-colored booklets that clearly lay out how uninsured individuals can participate in the federal exchange, which the healthcare action team of DAI produced, leaders hope to reach hundreds of thousands of uninsured.

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Since February, One LA has enrolled over 3,000 eligible for Medicaid expansion through its mobile enrollment clinics held in local congregations. In the process, they discovered thousands of low wage taxpayers left out of Obamacare due to their immigration status. Hundreds of One LA leaders assembled mid-October to call on veteran County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky to create and fund a County-based health coverage program for 1 million undocumented residents. The Supervisor agreed to meet with One LA within 30 days to begin discussion of the plan.

Leaders also testified to the challenges experienced when trying to enroll people on Covered California, the state based health exchange that opened October 1. A board member and staff member of Covered California agreed to meet with One LA before the end of the year to discuss changes needed in the health exchanges outreach strategy.

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"Meeting city, state, faith and education leaders on Thursday, Sen. John McComish, of District 18, voiced his continued support for Gov. Jan Brewer's plan to expand Medicaid in the state at a panel hosted by the Valley Interfaith Project (VIP).....McComish and Rep. Heather Carter, of District 15, pushed the expansion that would give Medicaid to about 300,000 low-income Arizona residents.

VIP's crowd included nearly 800 people from surrounding churches, school districts and organizations."

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Leaders of Dallas Area Interfaith called on Texas legislators to support bi-partisan House Bill 3791 which would expand Medicaid to insure an additional 1.5 million Texans. Clergy from Jewish, Catholic and Protestant congregations announced that DAI had collected over 5,000 signatures in the last few months in support of expansion Medicaid.

Printable press release

"With a call for a "pragmatic" approach to the expansion of Medicaid healthcare for the poor, the leaders of the Together Louisiana alliance of congregations has challenged Governor Bobby Jindal and lawmakers to work with the federal government on expanding health coverage for the poor. "We don't need an ideological discussion about Obamacare," the Rev. Melvin Rushing of Baton Rouge told a State Capitol rally. "We need our state's technocrats to sit down with the national Medicaid technocrats and work through this issue as the practical, pragmatic matter it is."

Our Views: Poor need coverage, The Advocate (4/29)

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"A new analysis by the nonpartisan Legislative Fiscal Office said accepting the Medicaid expansion envisioned by the federal health care law -- but so far refused by Gov. Bobby Jindal's administration -- would save Louisiana between $532 million and $544 million over the next five years.....

The theme of Tuesday's rally -- led by Together Louisiana, a recently formed coalition of religious and civic groups, and the American Association for Retired People -- was that if Jindal doesn't like the Medicaid program, he should insist on certain conditions while accepting the expansion...."

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"L.A. County is teaming with OneLA to hold enrollment events in places where those needing healthcare coverage naturally congregate, such as churches and schools....Volunteers are identifying people through the church parishes and doing pre-screening so the enrollment can occur on the spot. Some of the people are eligible for Medi-Cal, and others are being enrolled in Healthy Way LA, a temporary coverage program until the Medi-Cal expansion takes place in 2014.

The effort relies on trained volunteers, with help from Neighborhood Legal Services and the L.A. County Department of Health Services. The volunteers are also working to link people with clinics near their homes."

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