Hospitals like ours comprise more than a quarter of the nearly 1,000 organizations that support Proposition 52. There’s a reason. Medi-Cal has been a successful cornerstone of California’s health care system for more than 50 years, providing a safety net for millions of residents and working families.
Proposition 52 ensures the continued availability of matching federal funds that help pay for services provided by our hospitals to Medi-Cal patients. Statewide, more than 13 million Californians, including 6.7 million children, 1.6 million seniors and 4.5 million low-income working families depend on Medi-Cal for their health care needs.
Proposition 52 protects a partnership first created in 2009 between the state and local hospitals that has resulted in approximately $18 billion in new federal funds that would otherwise be unavailable, at no new cost to state taxpayers. Under the partnership, hospitals provide the state with up-front funds necessary to receive matching federal dollars. The combined federal and hospital money is then re-distributed to hospitals based on their Medi-Cal patient caseload.
But the law creating this partnership expires in 2017, putting billions of dollars at risk of being left unclaimed in Washington, D.C. if Proposition 52 isn’t passed by voters.
We hope you take time to learn more about this important ballot measure by visiting the Proposition 52 campaign website at www.yesprop52.org. You can also follow the campaign on Twitter @Yes52TriedTrue and on Facebook by “liking” the initiative at Facebook.com/YesProp52/.
Lynne Ashbeck
VP of Population Health and Community Engagement
Community Medical Centers
