Despite assurances from our knowledgeable and forthright President, George W. Bush, that global warming does not exist, Nobel scientists and their colleagues around the planet can prove to us that the ice is melting. Despite assurances from our knowledgeable and forthright governor, Ted Kulongoski, that the federal government and the private health insurance industry have succeeded in providing affordable health care to Oregonians and Oregon's public institutions and that Oregon does not have a moral and economic health care crisis, the following facts persist:
1. Huge numbers of Oregonians have no health insurance.
2. Huge numbers of Oregonians pay for such costly health insurance that they can afford little or no actual health care.
3. All of Oregon's public institutions are facing skyrocketing and unstoppable increases in health care costs which significantly diminish the quality and quantity of services that need to be provided to the public.

The latest evidence that our public treasuries are bleeding to death, to the point that a "patient" may die, was revealed in a recent story in the Oregonian reported by Shelby Oppel Wood.

Sell a university? Idea stuns board
Education - A state higher ed official suggests closing a campus to put finances on firmer footing
Saturday, March 04, 2006
http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/news/1141442746186420.xml&coll=7

a staff presentation showed university system expenses -- especially costs for employee health care -- are far outpacing revenues. ... The time has come for bold steps. "I think we need to alert people we are at the wall," said Dyess ...  Board President Henry Lorenzen and board member Tim Nesbitt agreed, saying consideration of a sale or closure shouldn't occur until all other options for ensuring the system's viability have been exhausted ... the board took a first step in approving a set of proposals it may take to the Legislature, aimed at saving money for the university system. They include removing university system employees from state group insurance plans.
[The schools under consideration for sale or closure are] Eastern Oregon University in La Grande, Oregon Institute of Technology in Klamath Falls, Southern Oregon University in Ashland and Western Oregon University in Monmouth.
After reading this story I was motivated to contact every member of the State Board of Higher Education and suggest an alternative remedy to ensure the long-term financial health of Oregon's seven state universities. I told them that the solution to their problem as well as that of every other public institution in our state that is facing the same dilemma and the moral and economic health care crisis facing every Oregonian is the Oregon Community Health Care Bill. 
The Oregon Community Health Care Bill is a politically centrist solution to Oregon's health care crisis capable of attracting support from left and right, Republicans and Democrats, urban - suburban - rural because it:
1. Is the most market driven health care plan in America.
2. Removes the burden from businesses of providing health care and places it on the state of Oregon.
3. Reduces health care costs to public institutions in Oregon by 20%.
4. Provides actual health care not just health insurance.
5. Eliminates the term, "preexisting condition." If the procedure is covered you're covered.
6. Provides affordable health care - on a sliding scale according to income - as good as that received by any public employee in Oregon to anyone willing to make a commitment to Oregon for one year as a registered voter.

I informed the State Board of Higher Education that current supporters of the Oregon Community Health Care Bill, Pete Sorenson - Lane County Commissioner and candidate for governor, Sam Adams - Portland City Commissioner, Jim Robison - small business owner and candidate for House district #44, Jeff Cogen - Chief of staff to Portland City Commissioner Dan Saltzman and candidate for Multnomah County Commission district #2, the Oregon Sustainable Agriculture Land Trust et al., could be helpful to them. I also urged the board to recommend the Oregon Community Health Care Bill to the legislature before they choose to close a university.
The ice is melting. The patients are bleeding. We have the power, though not yet the will, to stop both.

Richard Ellmyer
Oregon Community Health Care Bill author and project champion
President, MacSolutions Inc. - A Macintosh computer consulting business providing web hosting for artists and very small businesses.
Writer/Publisher - Oregon Health Watcher commentary - Published on the Internet and distributed to 6000 readers interested in public health care policy in Oregon.
http://www.goodgrowthnw.org/health.html
http://www.goodgrowthnw.org/octoberpoll.html
http://www.goodgrowthnw.org/candidates.h