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Posts Tagged ‘Medicare’

Congressman visits retirement community

By admin: 06/14/2011 @ 11:59 am

 

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Skagit Valley Herald

U.S. Rep. Rick Larsen (D-Everett) held a town hall meeting May 20 at Country Meadow Village to discuss the vote taken a month before in the House of Representatives that would turn Medicare into a voucher system, starting with people younger than 55. The plan, which passed 235-193 on April 15, also would eliminate benefits recently implemented in the Affordable Care Act of 2010, directly affecting people on Medicare.

The bill was voted down in the Senate by a vote of 57-40, with five Republicans voting against it.

“These are important issues for our residents and their families,” Country Meadow Village Program Director David Bricka said. “We are honored that Congressman Larsen chose to come to our community to discuss them with us because we all like to stay informed on current events.”

“This has been such a great opportunity to educate people about this bill,” Executive Director Tracy Willis said. Prior to Larsen’s visit, residents read material about the Republican proposal and were encouraged to come up with questions for the congressman.

After an hour-long question-and-answer session, attendees were treated to homemade cookies, coffee and tea in the private dining room. Larsen also visited Country Meadow Village’s new satellite branch of the Sedro-Woolley Museum.

Several days later, after returning to Washington D.C., Larsen had a second opportunity to vote down the Medicare proposal.

He released this statement on June 1: “House Republicans are not giving up on their plan to end Medicare as we know it. Today they once again tried to pass the Ryan budget that would slash the critical medical benefits that seniors need and deserve.

“Local seniors have made it clear to me that they want me to continue fighting to protect Medicare, and I want to assure them that today I voted against the Republican plan to slash Medicare.”

Pictured: Country Meadow Village Executive Director Tracy Willis, U.S. Rep. Rick Larsen and Country Meadow Program Director David Bricka pose for a photograph during Larsen’s May 20 visit to the retirement community

 
 
 

Larsen questions health proposals in S-W visit

By admin: 05/24/2011 @ 2:39 pm

 

By Lynsi Burton
Skagit Valley Herald

SEDRO-WOOLLEY — U.S. Rep. Rick Larsen spoke to a crowd of seniors at Country Meadow Village in Sedro-Woolley Friday to criticize congressional Republicans’ efforts to reform Medicare and Medicaid.

The Everett Democrat spoke to about three dozen people in a discussion that centered around health care policies, which has become a focus of highly partisan debate as Congress deals with the budget deficit.

Larsen attacked the budget proposal passed by the Republican-ruled U.S. House of Representatives, which proposes a voucher system for Medicare and a block grant approach to Medicaid. The budget, advocated by Rep. Paul Ryan, RWisconsin, passed April 15 on a 235-193 vote without any Democrats in favor and four Republicans against it. The timing of the Senate’s vote on the budget has yet to be determined.

“I don’t believe we ought to be balancing the budget on the backs of seniors,” Larsen said of the budget, adding that it would compromise medical expense coverage for seniors and increase their health care costs. “It would take Medicare and end Medicare as we know it today.”

In a column that appeared in newspapers Wednesday, Ryan said the safety net for low-income individuals will remain intact, despite what Democrats claim.

“Hysterical predictions about what would happen to low-income Americans under our budget are not just wildly unrealistic, they are dangerously deluded about the urgent need to avert a crisis that would have devastating effects on the poor,” he says in the column.

The Republicans’ plan to turn Medicare into a voucher program and Medicaid into a capped grant program would just shift costs from the federal government onto states and individuals, Larsen said.

“I’m not on that bandwagon,” he said.

Rosaria Linn, who lives at Country Meadow Village, said living and health care expenses are rising all the time for her and it’s difficult to keep up.

“Everybody’s struggling,” she said, adding that she faces growing medical expenses. “It takes a lot of your money.”

Marsha Roney, a Mount Vernon resident to attended the talk, said she doesn’t trust the Republican proposal. Medicare has prevented she and her husband from facing astronomical medical costs amid cancer treatment and surgeries, she said.

“Medicare has been a tremendous thing for us,” Roney said.
Linn, however, was skeptical of the whole debate.

“Seems like the way they talk is always the same,” she said. “The government better wake up and take care of the people who have paid them all these years.”

Pictured: Jim Hicks of Mount Vernon shakes hands with Rep. Rick Larsen Friday at Country Meadow Village in Sedro-Woolley. Larsen spoke to residents of the retirement community about Medicare and Medicaid issues, among others. Hicks, a WWII navy vet, asked Larsen if he could help him get a new set of front teeth from the Veterans Administration to replace the set he was given after a war-related injury in the South Pacific. Hicks said the VA told him they cannot find his records. Picture by Frank Varga.