Bee Moorhead's Testimony on CHIP

Testimony of Bee Moorhead, Texas Impact Executive Director
Regarding the Children’s Health Insurance Program
House Human Services Committee
March 1, 2007

Good afternoon. My name is Bee Moorhead and I am the executive director of Texas Impact. Texas Impact is a statewide, interfaith advocacy organization that was established by Texas religious leaders in 1973 to be a voice of religious social concern to the Texas Legislature.

Texas Impact works with faith communities across Texas on a variety of public policy issues that reflect the broadly held social concerns of the Abrahamic tradition and other faith traditions.  

We educate congregations and individuals about current issues and offer scriptural and theological frameworks for evaluating policy options. We also provide opportunities for individuals and congregations to engage in issue advocacy.

You have heard from policy experts and children’s advocates about the need for CHIP, the problems families face under program’s current constraints, the modest funding needed to make the program more robust, and the many benefits to Texas’ economy and healthcare system of restoring CHIP.

I am grateful for the opportunity to share with you information about how and why Texas faith communities have been and continue to be strong advocates for CHIP.

Concern for children’s health is one of the most broadly held of religious social concerns.

Religious communities have a special interest in the welfare of children because they are among “the least of these”—that is, the members of the community least able to advocate for themselves or to meet their own basic needs. Also, religious communities have a special interest in health and access to health care because of our universal respect for life and our understanding that God calls us to prevent and alleviate suffering.

Concerns for children and for human health have prompted religious communities to provide healthcare services. Many faith traditions are actively involved in supporting hospitals, clinics and other healthcare ministries.

In recent years, the conversation about health care within the religious communities has broadened to include concern about health insurance. When Jesus told the story of the Good Samaritan and challenged the religious leaders of his time to consider “Who is my neighbor?” there was no such thing as health insurance. In the modern world, we know that loving our neighbor includes directing our attention to public policies and programs that impact our neighbor’s health and well-being.

The existence of health insurance, including publicly sponsored insurance like CHIP, takes health care out of the exclusive realm of charity, where we seek merely to alleviate suffering, and places it in the realm of justice, where we seek to prevent suffering through proactive, preemptive strategies.

So given all these concerns—for children, for health, and for justice—it’s no surprise that children’s health insurance has been a major concern for Texas faith communities.

Texas faith communities were strong advocates for establishment of CHIP. Individual congregations and local faith-based organizations helped to promote and make it successful. And we were deeply disappointed in 2003 when CHIP funding was cut, taking the program and our state years backward in our commitment to our children and our state healthcare infrastructure.

CHIP strikes a chord with a lot of people because

• it is understandable (limited program addressing a common need)
• it is fair (parents pay a share)
• it is a “just” solution (addresses the “hit and miss” availability of employer-sponsored coverage in low-wage jobs)
• it seems sensible policy (good federal match)
• it seems doable (state funds needed are modest)
• it was working fine until 2003

    
In 2004, the United Methodist Women of Texas asked Texas Impact to develop a grassroots campaign for them to express their concern for CHIP cuts. In response, we created a postcard for them to distribute within their local groups, calling for restoration of cuts to the CHIP program.

We suggested the women set a goal of collecting 1,000 postcards, and when they met their target after just a few weeks, we delivered the cards to the Governor in a giant Valentine. And we told them to keep collecting the postcards.

When other faith communities heard what the United Methodist Women were doing, they asked if they could participate. We had large urban congregations request hundreds of cards to put out for people to sign after weekly worship. We had requests to distribute the cards at denominational meetings, women’s conventions, and in Sunday school classes.

We collected the cards through the end of the 2005 legislative session, making several deliveries to the Governor, the Lt. Governor, the Speaker and other leaders. After taking a break to let the dust settle from the 2005 session, we re-launched the postcard campaign late in 2006.

As of today, there have been more than 36,000 cards turned in.

Some of the religious organizations and communities throughout Texas that have participated in the postcard campaign include:

• The Baptist General Convention of Texas
• The Catholic Diocese of Austin
• The United Methodist Women
• Church Women United
• National Council of Jewish Women
• Austin Area Interreligious Ministries
• Central Dallas Ministries
• Methodist Healthcare Ministries
• Women of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
• Mission Presbytery
• North Texas Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church
• Texas Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church
• Southwest Texas Annual Conference Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church
• Texas Conference of Churches

Some judicatories have passed resolutions supporting CHIP restoration, including the Texas and North Texas Annual Conferences of the United Methodist Church.

Within the religious communities, support for CHIP restoration has been strong even in more conservative congregations. The message consistently has been, “This one program is a good model, and the state should make it as robust as possible. We can’t solve every problem for Texas families, but this is a concrete, manageable strategy and we should not delay in restoring it.”

In July 2004, Texas religious leaders issued a statement on CHIP restoration. The statement was unusual in that all 15 Catholic bishops, Baptist General Convention of Texas Executive Director Charles Wade, the directors of the American Jewish Congress and the American Jewish Committee, as well as bishops and other leaders of mainline Protestant churches joined together in signing the statement, which says “The health of Texas children must surely be among our very highest priorities as a state.”

We have not asked for a follow-up statement from religious leaders for the current legislative session, but if the committee believes it would be helpful we would be very happy to undertake that effort.

Finally, I want to clarify for you what constitutes “restoring CHIP” from the standpoint of the religious communities. As you can see, our postcard refers to the same list of restorations that you have heard and will hear from other groups. Of the items on that list, there is no item that is more important than 12-month continuous eligibility.

One of the biggest reasons CHIP has such broad appeal is its similarity in the public’s mind to private insurance. Anyone who has private insurance, whether employer-sponsored or individual, is familiar with the process of “annual enrollment.” It simply makes no sense to tout CHIP as a model for increasing family self-sufficiency and then to treat enrolled families as needing extraordinary supervision and constant second-guessing.

Reinstating 12-month continuous eligibility would clarify the Legislature’s intention that CHIP really is intended to expand the availability of affordable health insurance to working Texas families.

On behalf of Texas Impact’s board of directors and the tens of thousands of Texans whose faith calls them to advocate for this program, I thank you for the opportunity to present this testimony. I would be happy to answer any questions.