Fate of Health Care Reform May Rest in Senate Health Committee

by Julia Rosen [courtesy of Working Californians blogs]

It has come down to this: will any Democratic Senator on the health care committee vote against the proposal besides Sen. Shelia Kuehl? The Capitol Weekly has all of the wonky details:

The Senate Health Committee is chaired by Sen. Sheila Kuehl, D-Santa Monica, who is openly opposing the bill. Kuehl’s opposition gives the bill’s supporters a single-vote margin on the 11-member health committee.

That means that any Democrat on the committee could single-handedly sink the proposal. And not all of the committee members are sure they’re going to vote for the bill. Kuehl, who has promised an exhaustive examination of the proposal, delayed the first hearing by a week.

“The issue I have is that we have a $14 billion shortfall,” said Sen. Leland Yee, D-San Francisco. “We are cutting services like you cannot believe. So how can we pay for a new health care plan?”

The Senate, in particular this committee is moving slowly on this proposal to examine all of the details. This will not be a repeat of the rapid fire passage of the energy deal during the Enron crisis. AB 1x1 is a major piece of legislation that should impact just about every single Californian. I for one am glad that it is being gone over with a fine tooth comb.