Governor holds town hall-style meeting
Governor Deval Patrick came to Needham on the third stop of a 15-city tour of town hall-style meetings scheduled for this summer.
By Kathryn Eident
Globe Correspondent
Health care reforms and cuts to special needs programs topped the agenda Tuesday night as nearly 100 area residents gathered on the Town Common for an informal meeting with Governor Deval Patrick.
Patrick came to Needham on the third stop of a 15-city tour of town hall-style meetings scheduled across the state this summer. He spent nearly two hours answering questions and taking comments from people perched on folding chairs, standing in groups and sitting in the grass as the sun set behind them.
Tuesday night’s meeting also came hours after Patrick signed a law ending pension abuses by state employees.
“People have been waiting for that for over 10 years. We were told we’d never get pension reform, but we got it,” he said to applause from the crowd. “The times when resources are limited are when we should get on with a reform agenda.”
(For Globe coverage of the bill, click HERE.)
For Allen Ginsberg, a former Natick resident who now lives on Cape Cod, the governor’s Needham meeting was a chance to talk about health care reforms. As a self-employed acupuncturist, Ginsberg pays for his own health insurance, and says that insurance through the state is often more expensive than what’s offered in the private sector.
“For myself and my wife, it’s our single largest expense. We pay about $22,000 to $24,000 a year for health insurance,” he said. “I’d like to see someone keep their eye on the ball.”
The meeting was informal, with the crowd sprawled on blankets and lounging in the grass.
Patrick responded by assuring Ginsberg the state is monitoring, and that keeping the health care affordable is a priority.
“There is lots of watching going on, and lots of dialogue between insurers and hospitals,” he said. “Health care costs are serious, whether or not we have health care coverage.”
Patrick also addressed budget cuts, reminding the crowd that he is facing tough decisions when it comes to balancing the state’s budget.
“Right now I have to make choices, and every one of them is miserable,” he said. “I’m doing the best I can without a whole lot of money.”
Some of those “miserable choices” may affect Lynn, a Brookline resident and a member of the Charles River Center in Needham. As a woman with developmental disabilities, she relies on the programs the non-profit offers to help her through her everyday life. But like many agencies dependent on state money, those programs could be in jeopardy if funding is cut.
Governor Patrick addresses cus to special needs and education programs.
“I don’t think it’s right to take from programs with special needs,” she told Patrick. “They should take it from somewhere else.”
Case Manager Michelle DeSouza, who escorted Lynn to the event, said Patrick is doing the best he can in a bad situation.
“He’s trying. The money can only be disbursed so far,” she said afterward. But, “to cut back funding will cripple the foundation of what we teach: to live a normal, functioning life.”
Patrick responded to most of the questions about budget cuts with a similar, but sympathetic answer.
“There’s a growing collection of mail on my desk that follows a similar theme. It says, ‘I know you’re having a tough time, Governor, but not my program,” he said. “But it’s all the programs…All I can say is, I’ll do my best.”
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Health care reform: Yes, start with elder care, nursing homes. It's horrible that cuts will only drive the elderly into nursing homes, when they cut corners and kill patients for profit. Sun Healthcare Group Inc. for example, killed my mother with known broken equipment in 2003-2004, four other patients also died from their wilful misconduct. No serious fines by Dept of Health nor Dept of Justice who had an existing injuction against them at the time not to have that same broken equipment ever again. They have a former congresswoman on their board and they have an active Polticial Action Committee, all legal. They KILLED MY MOTHER and did not compensate me for wrongful death, pain and suffering, elder abuse -only for fraud. Somehow my attorney 'missed it" and I sued him for malpractice and won, he died 2 weeks later. I think I'll write a book
Wouldn't you ask all the skilled nursing facilities to return the tens of millions of dollars that were overpaid, and correct their financial statements for shareholders to reflect the mistake? see article:
Tens of millions of dollars were likely inappropriately paid to skilled nursing facilities through the Medicare Part D prescription drug program in 2006, according to a recently released report from the Department of Health and Human Services Office of the Inspector General.
According to the OIG report, Part D spent roughly $41 million that year to pay for drugs for nursing home residents who should have been covered under the Medicare Part A benefit. While admitting that a small number of facilities constituted the vast majority of inappropriate payments-30 long-term care pharmacies were responsible for 18% of the payments-investigators say that nearly every SNF and half of all pharmacies have at least one Part A patient inappropriately receiving Part D subsidized prescriptions.
Potentially inappropriate nursing home payments spur increased Medicare Part A, Part D oversight
June 08, 2009
In response to the oversight, the OIG made a series of recommendations to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, which include more oversight and guidance for skilled nursing facilities. Specifically, OIG told CMS to implement retrospective reviews to prevent future inappropriate payments, and to further educate facilities, pharmacies and drug plans about which Medicare plan is responsible for which medication repayment
Write a book Debora Calvert! That is horrible what Sunbridge did to your mother and you. Did you call the department of health? What did they say? We need reform.
Things to do in Needham