2/07/07 Vol. 4 No. 3

LAST COMMITTEE HEARING!

House Health Care/Wellness. House Bill 1460 is scheduled for a hearing on Monday, February 12, 2007 at 1:30 p.m. in Hearing Room A of the John L O’Brien building before the House Health Care and Wellness Committee. We urge you to attend the committee hearing and sign in supporting mental health parity.

Lobbying Committee Members! Please email or telephone your state Representatives on the health care committee and as many of the other committee members as you can to urge them to vote “yes” on the mental health parity bill. (See below for our proposed message.) Small business owners’ contacts with state Representatives will be especially crucial to our efforts. If you are a small business owner, please do your best to contact your Representatives and the other health care committee members this week.

HOUSE HEALTH CARE/WELLNESS

 

Democratic Representative

District

Email

Telephone

Eileen Cody, chair

34

cody.eileen@leg.wa.gov

(360) 786-7978

Dawn Morrell, vice chair

25

morell.dawn@leg.wa.gov

(360) 786-7968

Don Barlow

6

barlow.don@leg.wa.gov

(360 786-7922

Tami Green

28

green.tami@leg.wa.gov

(360) 786-7958

Jim Moeller

49

moeller.jim@leg.wa.gov

(360) 786-7872

Jamie Pederson

43

pedersen.jamie@leg.wa.gov

(360) 786-7826

Shay Schual-Berke

33

schual-berke.shay@leg.wa.gov

(360) 786-7834

Larry Seaquist

26

seaquist.larry@leg.wa.gov

(360) 786-7802

 

 

 

 

Republican Representative

District

Email

Telephone

Bill Hinkle, ranking

13

hinkle.bill@leg.wa.gov

(360) 786-7808

Gary Alexander

20

alexander.gary@leg.wa.gov

(360) 786-7990

Tom Campbell

2

campbell.tom@leg.wa.gov

(360) 786-7912

Cary Condotta

12

condotta.cary@leg.wa.gov

(360) 786-7954

Richard Curtis

18

curtis.richard@leg.wa.gov

(360) 786-7850

Message for the House Committee Members:

I respectfully urge you to vote “yes” on House Bill 1460, the mental health parity bill, and to pass the bill out of committee. It is time to end insurance discrimination against people living with a mental illness! Mental health parity will result in only minimal increases to insurance premiums in the small group and individual insurance markets. These small increases in premiums are more than outweighed by the benefits to small businesses and individuals in terms of reductions in other health care costs, increased productivity, less absenteeism, and fewer claims for disability and unemployment insurance. Please vote “yes” on the mental health parity bill.

Legislative Finder. If you do not know who your legislators are or what district you reside in, please go to http://apps.leg.wa.gov/districtfinder/ . You may also call the Legislative Hotline at 1-800-562-6000 to encourage your Representatives to vote for parity, but telephoning the Representatives’ offices directly is more effective.

Please be sure to transmit this Action Alert! to everyone in your email network. If you have any questions about the coalition or the parity bill, please contact Chelene Alkire at (206) 216-2545 or by email at chelenea@wsha.org or me at randyr@wsha.org. Please reply to this email and let Chelene know you have forwarded our message to your email contacts! Thank you for your continuing support! With your help, we will end insurance discrimination against people living with a mental illness in Washington State!

Randy Revelle, Chairman