Press Release

The Children's Partnership is pleased to announe that Beth Morrow, Director of Health IT Initiatives, is joining the  Consumer Empowerment Workgroup (CEWG) of the Health IT Policy Committee (HITPC). The newly formed Consumer Empowerment Workgroup’s charge is to provide recommendations on policy issues and opportunities for strengthening the ability of consumers, patients, and lay caregivers to manage health and health care for themselves or others.  Download the full statement here. 

Santa Monica, CA - Wendy Lazarus, Founder & Co-President, joins a broad coalition of health care officials and advocates for a press event in Los Angeles to urge state elected officials to move quickly to expand Medi-Cal.  If legislation to expand Medi-Cal is not signed into law in the next 6 weeks, over one million low-income, working people will be left without coverage as healthcare reform is implemented. For each month of delay, California will lose hundreds of millions of federal dollars.

From Ms. Lazarus' statement, "After decades of work to secure health coverage and care for California’s 10 million children, we are finally only 188 days away from when the doors to that coverage will open thanks to the Affordable Care Act. The Medi-Cal expansion is an indispensable piece to ensure that when families start to enroll on October 1, 1.4 million low-income parents and childless adults will not be left out. Although the Medi-Cal expansion would provide coverage for adults, it also affects millions of children." 

Download Ms. Lazarus' full statement and event press release. 

The Children''s Partnership joins a coalition of child advocates to ensure that children with autism do not lose access to critical behavioral health services after their transition from Healthy Families to Medi-Cal. “The state needs to address this urgent situation immediately and ensure children in Medi-Cal receive medically necessary behavioral health therapies,” said Wendy Lazarus, Founder & Co-President of The Children’s Partnership. “Because of this serious problem, the state should not move forward with any future phases of the Healthy Families transition until the issue is resolved and continuity of care can be assured.”

Download the full press release here. (pdf)

The Children's Partnership and SPARC co-released Electronic Information Exchange: Elements that Matter for Children in Foster Care, an issue brief that lays out the case for investing in systems that enable electronic information exchange for children and youth in foster care, reviews existing efforts underway in states and communities, identifies specific elements that serve this population most effectively, and discusses steps that state advocates can take to establish an integrated electronic record of care for foster children and youth in their state.

The Children’s Partnership and SPARC will be hosting an webinar on Thursday, January 31^st at 2:00pm EST. Speakers will include Beth Morrow, Director of Health IT Initiatives at The Children’s Partnership, author of the issue brief. 

You can register for the webinar here.

Santa Monica, CA– Today, The Children’s Partnership released an issue brief and action plan addressing the challenges Medi-Cal faces in providing dental care to children in California. The issue brief, Fix Medi-Cal Dental Coverage: Half of California Kids Depend On It, also stresses the impact that newly enrolled children will have on the state’s strained dental care system. “California’s Medi-Cal dental system is already struggling to serve children and is unprepared for what’s to come,” said Wendy Lazarus, Founder & Co-President of The Children’s Partnership. “California’s kids deserve real access to quality dental care—not a false promise of it.” The brief highlights the challenges facing Medi-Cal in providing dental care to children, examines the State’s efforts to address these problems, and provides an action plan to help the program serve its growing number of enrollees. 

Download the full press statement here . 

The Governor has jumpstarted the New Year well by solidifying the state’s newfound fiscal stability and opening the door to new opportunities to shore up and strengthen programs for California’s children and families. A statement from Wendy Lazarus, Founder and Co-President of The Children’s Partnership, was released today in response to the Governor’s Budget announcement. 

Read the full statement here.

On January 1, 2013, federal lawmakers passed a bill that will improve social workers’ access to school records of the children and youth in foster care that they support. 

"Through the Uninterrupted Scholars Act, Congress has provided an important stepping stone to improve outcomes for children and youth in foster care," said Beth Morrow, Director, Health IT Initiatives. Download her full statement here .

Read about the Uninterrrupted Scholars Act here. 

The Children's Partnership joins the coalition of California health advocates and providers calling on Governor Brown and the Legislature to renew a critical revenue source -- a Managed Care Organization (MCO) assessment that could raise approximately $350 million per year --- to address the health care needs of children.

Download the full statement here.

The Children's Partnership joins other national children’s advocacy organizations to applaud Senator Barbara A. Mikulski for her efforts to ensure children are held harmless in the ongoing budget negotiations. Chair of the HELP Committee on Children and Families, Mikulski has written a letter addressed to the House and Senate leadership co-signed by Sens. Al Franken (D-MN), Robert P. Casey, Jr. (D-PA) and Tim Johnson (D-SD).

Downoad the full press statement here. 

California plans to start moving children from the Healthy Families Program into Medi-Cal on January 1. The Children's Partnership joins other advocates to highlight the importance of assuring children’s health care is not disrupted.

“The health of the 875,000 children who will move from Healthy Families to Medi-Cal, as well as the nearly 3.7 million children currently in enrolled in Medi-Cal, depends on the success of this transition. All eyes will be on the state. We and families across California are counting on state officials to track and quickly resolve any problems that arise,” said Wendy Lazarus, Founder and Co-President of The Children’s Partnership.

Download the full press release here.