I want to preface this comment by saying that I feel for the families and the children that it would help, but as the Healthy Kids Plan stands, I cannot support it. You say that we as a state have a "moral obligation" to protect our children, but from what I can see we are just passing the buck to smokers. What the column above doesn't mention is that the plan will be financed with an $0.84 per pack tax on cigarettes, which I believer is wrong. Smokers have no more duty to protect children than you or I.

Oregon currently has a cigarette tax of $1.18, which was well above the national average last I checked. Although increases are usually marketed as going to smoking prevention, as it stands, only 3% of the $220 million collected in 2005 such programs, well below the CDC recommended minimum of $21 million. Instead, these tax revenues went mostly to the Oregon Health Plan and to the state's general fund, things which all Oregonians benefit from, not just smokers. (I'm sorry I don't have the figures for 2006, but I would bet that they are very similar).

Proponents usually justify these expenditures by creating statistics which claim that smokers create a tremendous financial burden on the state in the form of healthcare costs, but when all factors are taken into account (i.e. the shorter life expectancy of smokers, etc.), the per pack amount borne by the tax-payers is about $0.30 (that figure comes from a reputable congressional report from 1994, so adjusted that might be closer to $0.40 today, still well below the the current state tax).

What is more, funding the Healthy Kids Plan with a cigarette tax creates a moral dilemma. Again, the proponents also tout the fact that increased cigarette taxes lead to fewer smokers, but is that what they really want? Imagine if six months after this plan was put into effect every Oregon smoker quit smoking; there would be no more cigarette tax revenues, and by extension, no more healthcare for needy kids. I realize that this scenario is extremely improbable, but I personally don't think it is right that our government have choose between tax revenues and the health of its citizens. You may call that claim prepostrous, but Kulongoski himself was quoted in 2002 as saying that an increase in the cigarette tax would be foolish because it would discourage consumption (thereby lowering tax revenues).

So that's why I don't like this plan as it stands. I think that if the state chooses to provide healthcare for Oregon's children, the burden should be borne equally by the populace, not an underrepresented minority. You nonsmokers out there ask yourself-are you fulfilling your moral obligation to Oregon's children by passing the resposibility of paying for their healthcare to smokers?

This proposal's underhanded funding mechanism betrays it as an underpowered attempt to remedy a clamity. The wreck of the social service agency that is our health-care system today is that calamity; it is like being on a sinking ship trying to take care of your family these days. Have we really reached the point of desperation where we are packing our children into the inadequate lifeboats and setting them adrift? That does leave us to go down with the ship, you know!

I'd like to see a discussion of the bold plan of Dr. Kitzhaber's "The Oregon Better Health Act", which sounds like the kind of cutting-edge, pioneering activism that Oregon has earned respect for doing in years past. We can do better than this further investment in a bankrupt health-care scheme.

Making smokers finance this plan is an irresponsible cowardly cop-out. We need to fix our health care system in a fair and equitable way. We ALL need to take responsibility for providing a base of health care for all. Making those "nasty smokers" support it with a "sin" tax is really lame. Why should they be the only "responsible" ones?

If "Oregon's children" what health care, why don't they just get a job like everyone else?

I guess this is a good thing, but . . .

My concern with the effort to provide health care coverage to children (only) is that this will only delay adoption of a health plan that will provide universal coverage.

It is good that every child will have access to paid health care. However, when the child's mother or father must remain at home coughing up blood because the parent cannot afford to go to the doctor, that is arguably just as big a threat to the welfare of the child as being uninsured.

Also, from a political standpoint, once the cute and innocent uninsured children are taken out of the mix, the legislature will have much less incentive to adopt a health care system to provide coverage to the less-cute and less-innocent unemployed, working poor and the growing number of middle class folks who can't afford health insurance coverage.

The Healthy Kids Plan does not preclude, slow down, or dim the possibilities of broader health care reform and it's heartless to make children wait while we grownups work things out. As Dr. Kitzhaber has said repeatedly that the Healthy Kids Plan should pass, and quickly. The metaphor he uses is that, while our health care system as a whole is sinking, our children are drowning. And must be given a life raft NOW.

The tobacco industry has developed some good sound bites around the unfairness of targeting smokers. You'll notice that every lawmaker who opposes the Healthy Kids Plan has said the same thing. They've received their scripts. But don't fall for it. The Healthy Kids Plan is not about targeting an unloved population, i.e. smokers. It's about recouping a small portion of what the state pays as a result of smoking.

According to the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids, the health care costs of smoking to the state are $11.16 for each pack of cigarettes. Oregon's tax is $1.18 per pack. That means the cost to our state’s health care economy from smoking and the use of tobacco products amount to one billion dollars in expenditures per year, of which some $250 million are costs to the state’s Medicaid program.In other words, taxpayers.

The Healthy Kids Plan is a step in the right direction not only for uninsured kids, but for the financial future of our state. Smoking is putting an economic strain on the state. And thanks to the fact we are the only state to have actually DECREASED the cigarette tax in the last decade, smoking is increasing in Oregon while decreasing across the country.

Also, don't forget the savings that will come when kids start getting preventative care instead of having to go to the emergency room.

The Healthy Kids Plan is a smart move.

The funding mechanism proposed for this initiative is a stupid political move; it will tar the D's with the brush the R's have brandished long and hard: Democrats resort to unfair taxation schemes to solve funding dilemmas. It's an incommensurate punishment for making bad health-care decisions to fund health-care this way, and you will not overcome that salient fact. I find it no surprise it is driving the debate; no conspiracy theory is required.

Am I missing something? Let's see...

Working parents who can't afford to buy health insurance for their children

vs.

People who would have to pay extra to voluntarily engage in behavior proven to be detrimental to their own health and that of the general public

...............????

Personally, I'm not too worried about the D's - they're big kids and can handle a little pressure. Clearly, their party did something right last November. And I doubt they're paying much attention to those who would benefit from continuing the bitter partisanship and rancor of previous legislative sessions.

I'm more worried about those 117,000 children without health insurance... and not terribly impressed by people who preface their comments with support for the the idea of covering kids, then wring their hands with concern over the proposed revenue stream...

Perhaps we could get opinions on the actual Healthy Kids Plan instead?

Anyone who has a better idea for funding -or a good reason why CHILDREN should continue to go without- should submit it in writing to the House Committee on Health Care. I'm sure we're all curious to see what that would be.

Yes, you are missing something, a sense of political realities. What survives a campaign is not the end you pursue but the means by which you pursue it.

One election that goes our way does not erase all disagreeable opinions of the party that kept it in the minority after many previous elections, especially since the recent election was as much a referendum on the failures of the opposition party as it was anything else.

It is the cheap and easy funding mechanism that will generate any buzz, and that's just reality.

The OLCC just raised its prices 20% across the board. That revenue goes into the general fund. Perhaps this would be enough revenue to fund health care for our children, if not for us all?

Idealistic visionary that I am, assuming the OLCC is willing to do such a good deed.........

I have to go with Frank. Fund it out of the general fund.

The funding mechanism proposed is just plain faulty, and built upon crappy logic, by the proponents own admission:

According to the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids, the health care costs of smoking to the state are $11.16 for each pack of cigarettes. Oregon's tax is $1.18 per pack. That means the cost to our state’s health care economy from smoking and the use of tobacco products amount to one billion dollars in expenditures per year, of which some $250 million are costs to the state’s Medicaid program.

in other words, we can't HOPE to recover the costs, so why the heck are we even trying to base funding on this flawed construct??

Sorry, but a stable funding base would be more in line with my thinking. Perhaps the cell phone tax?

Why did the OLCC raise prices? What was the justification?

i'm not sure. i'll see if i can find out. i was given this information by someone who works in the industry. i'm assuming they do not need to justify their reasons just like you do not see most retailers explaining (openly) to their customers why their prices increase. 20% is a large amount though. i checked out their website and did not see anything mentioning the increase. i did see that for operating year 2005/2006 their net revenue was 191.80 million and of that, 139.70 million was distributed amongst a variety of funds (i was incorrect when i said all revenue goes into the general fund. only a little more than half does.). where that 50 plus million has gone is anybody's guess.

For those of you that missed my testimony at Mondays hearing, here it is.

One evening in early 2001 I took my 14-month-old daughter Molly, who had been fighting a cold for a few weeks, into the emergency room because she had begun vomiting. I was young, only 22, but I did know that children with colds didn't vomit. After a two-hour wait, we finally made it into an examination room.

This day in age, it is unnatural to bury your child. When a child dies, it doesn't just affect the parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles. It affects every person that ever knew the child and every person those people will ever meet. My sister, father and I have all moved to new cities and tried to start new lives. It will be seven years since her death next month and we are still haunted by the memory of a child that did not turn seven in December and the $432 test that would have made it possible to avoid the six year anniversary that will occur next month.

Everyone agrees that we need to make sure all children are able to receive quality, affordable health care. Why are we squabbling over where the funds come from and whether adults are covered?

Don't get me wrong, I'm a huge fan of covering all Oregonians, not only the children. And yes, I agree that a universal health care plan would be ideal. But by making children wait for the perfect plan, we are asking them to suffer and die for the selfishness of adults who want to use their cute innocent faces to gain coverage for us all. The Healthy Kids Plan is a building block for a universal health care system. It is not the end of the fight for health care, but the beginning. This plan can be integrated into a universal health care program that includes funding from other sources.

I still don't have health insurance and many of my employed friends go without as well. Early last year, I held a close friend while she died, uninsured, of cancer in my living room. As hard as that was, I am still not willing to ask other families to go through what we did in a hope that their kids faces will be the currency used to buy me into a universal health care program.