themergurynews editoriai BOARD I J
Barbara Vroman Associate editor
Pbil Yost Chiefeditorial xoriter

Copyrighted material reprinted with permission. For educational use only.

Sharon Noguchi Editorial

w
tive IS turning out to be. Its
.

success

the

Chil-

dren’s Health Initia

goal IS ambitious; maldng

..i

(V

VL

Santa Clara County the first in
the nation to have health cov
erage for all its children. Yet

today, little more than a year
since the idea was proposed,
that

' Editorial

o

John Fensterwald Editorial writer

Jim Braly Comm’enta^
- li

—1

for kids’health
KAT an incredible

(\

xoriter

Travis Armstrong Editor.

Success story

! f0

(G

Patty Fisher Editorial writer

Barbara Egbert Editorial xoriter

I The opinion

; ofthe

i Mercury

: News

looks

goal
re-

markably at

tainable.
What

Since January, an astonishing '

rate of about 100 each week
day. Phis far exceeds the spon

The initiative first was proA
program
to take advantage of revenue

fn

ing Partner-

the local labor-lfffiatef re’

search group, and People Act-

mg in Community Together '

(PACT) the faith-basedfeighborhood organizers TEpv

story by Michelle Gihdo tnlrl

Here county workers and oth-

er groups, including PACT, get

economy will make' money

harder to raise at thA same-

one is proving that

the growing gap between rich
and poor in this county, so we
need to attack individual

ton and Shasta County, this
low-income

parents

who know about
Healthy
Families
sign up for it.
The initiative still

®”^**et* insurance plans since

astonishing rate ofabout

faces major challengrt

es.

^00 each weekday.

'■«‘ention.

Q
w,

i.

Premium pay-

to let
times. Leg-

^‘^^^^P^'^gi’am is far better. ^ pw?”
for Healthy
t.
funding goes ' families insurance premiums
^^ids up for ex- ^

from pay-

poverty i

which ethnic or other

*®f^og state and federal pro- i pf^ecks would help, but that’s

“,^"tCal, for faV I J"he taking stages.

enrolled in insurance
plans *: of California, parents
lo too aren’t
much
uiance plans

rlewlett Packard are - early^
contributors. But the slotvingf

time it leaves more children in

uiinsui-ed children have been

.^^oalthy Families, for

program must come from pri- !
^te sources. , Calpine and

out the word. Like successful
outreach programs in Stock-

than 15,000 ofthe county's

15,000 of the county’s 70 000 I W

uninsured children have hppn

gvare of Healthy - Families .

eeptive county —and it's just

only sold Santa Clara CounW ! pfryT® '
eventually
and San Jose on the idea biR j came on board, and the counTuesday’s Mercurv New^ I

MARK WEBE R

‘ f

enthusiastic reception sent'
the sponsors to the more re-

initiative’s vi-

the compellinS.Se than

About half the ^ i

H4 million annual cost of the I

n om the national tobacco law
suit settlement. The city’^s un-

credit to the

they’re out on the street help
mg to make it happen
^

^ But the greatest challenge '*

sors most optimistic t'predic- '

tions.

a

sors"-S

them.

within the county may

by the out
under-served
so f)!-

reach

nnf]

E.v-. ,

need of help.

,, ’fkere is no one remedy for

sjmiptoms.

The

Housing..

Trust of Santa Clara Counta"

noted here ^esday, is tack-

hng affordable housing. The.
Children s Health Initiative is

an even more ambitious effort -

calling on government and the

private sector.

. A healthy child does better
m school and has a better

^

chance of escaping poverty. J

Community leaders in and out
of public office who’ve been

part of this initiative should be
proud of what they’ve accom-

plished

and of. the example

they re setting for the nation.
^orWommtion nn these vroer.

(7i»o

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