Communities find a voice in healthcare debate
The sharp, metallic chimes of our alarm clocks echoed down the hallway. “Hey, Kerry!” the group sung out in unison as we approached the Massachusetts’ Senator’s office. “Wake up!”
I traveled to D.C. on November 17, 2011, with a group of organizers and community leaders representing the People Improving Communities through Organizing (PICO) National Network. Days before an important deadline for the Congressional “super committee”—a group tasked with devising a deficit-reduction plan for the federal government—we had come to deliver a message: public healthcare programs like Medicaid and Medicare, a lifeline for many million Americans, should be protected from across-the-board cuts. With alarm clocks in hand, this was our “wake up call” for Congress.
But the day proved to be an awakening for me, too. I spent my time in D.C. thinking about the power of everyday people – their voices, their stories—and how CCHP is harnessing that power to improve healthcare in Camden.
At a rally in the Dirksen Senate Building, faith leaders, seniors, and people with disabilities from across the country urged the “super committee” to protect Medicare and Medicaid. From the rally, our PICO group of about thirty proceeded through a maze of underground tunnels and winding staircases, our small, golden alarm clocks ringing all the way. When we arrived at Senator John Kerry’s office, staffers greeted us. (I was amazed at how little resistance there was to our group marching in unannounced – and with alarm clocks!) A pastor from Massachusetts shared his congregation’s healthcare concerns with Senator Kerry’s Press Secretary, and then presented him with a box of petitions requesting no additional cuts to Medicaid and Medicare.
The final item on our agenda for the day was a meeting at the Department of Health and Human Services. Seated together at a long conference table, an HHS official listened carefully while PICO leaders discussed healthcare initiatives in their communities. Pilar Perry spoke on behalf of Camden Churches Organized for People (CCOP), one of CCHP’s member organizations. Her voice was sure and strong as she explained a recent CCHP success: the opening of a healthcare clinic in Northgate II, a housing complex that is home to many of Camden’s most frequent utilizers of Emergency Departments. Pilar, who lives in Northgate II, was an important part of the team that interviewed and organized residents to make the clinic a reality.
When I consider a giant problem, something like making high-quality healthcare affordable and sustainable, I sometimes get overwhelmed. It all seems too complicated, too technical, and I decide it’s better to leave these issues up to the “experts” in a place like Washington, D.C. But on this day, PICO reminded me that everyone has experience as a patient, a healthcare consumer. It is important for this kind of “expert” to get involved in the healthcare conversation, too.
I realized that CCHP could not achieve its mission of improving the quality and accessibility of healthcare in Camden, New Jersey, without participation by the residents we represent and serve. CCHP has community members on its Board. We work closely with groups like CCOP to reach out to residents directly, both to determine their healthcare needs and to solicit their ideas about how we can provide better care. In fact, it was this grassroots, problem-solving approach that gave rise to the Northgate II clinic Pilar talked about. I believe CCHP’s consistent, concerted focus on the people of Camden, our resident healthcare “experts,” is an important reason that our work is so effective.
My D.C. adventure, along with my work with CCHP more broadly, has opened my eyes to the human side of healthcare policy.
