ORANGE COUNTY PERSPECTIVE : Unhealthy Approach to Health

It stands to reason that an organization that will deliver health care to well over 100,000 Latinos in Orange County would take pains to see that members of that community are involved in the planning process--at the top.

But the seven-member board of directors of the Orange County OPTIMA program contains no Latinos, despite complaints a year ago from community groups asking for a voice in establishing this important new agency. Now those complaints have prompted an investigation by the federal Health and Human Services Department. Regardless of the outcome, Latino voices must be heard within OPTIMA.

The new agency is due to begin operations next year, replacing the Medi-Cal program in Orange County. The laudable purpose is to have a local and less cumbersome bureaucracy create a program to serve the poor better by emphasizing prevention rather than waiting for treatment of a medical crisis.

The need has grown even since the program was approved more than a year ago: Due to a worsening economy, those eligible for help are now estimated at nearly 300,000, up from 225,000.

A Latino leader estimated that as many as 80% of those treated will be Latino. Unfortunately, of 128 people who applied for positions on the OPTIMA board, only three were Latinos. OPTIMA officials were aware of that a year ago and said others who expressed interest never re-established contact with the agency.

But OPTIMA should have done more follow-up and strongly encouraged those who expressed interest. In the future it must work with Latino groups to make sure their members know of this chance to serve. After all, when the Orange County Grand Jury was criticized for lacking minority members, community groups helped recruit members to increase diversity on the panel.

Seven is an arbitrary number. Why not make it eight, and for starters see to it that the additional member is Latino? This new agency must not get off to a bad start with the community it will serve. Its task is too important.