Coad Readies Her Counterproposal for Tobacco Funds

Supervisor Cynthia Coad next week will present details of her plan for Orange County to spend half an estimated $765 million in tobacco settlement revenue on health care.

Her proposal, approved in concept by the five-member Board of Supervisors two weeks ago, would be the county-backed alternative to an initiative that appears headed for the November ballot and seeks 80% of the settlement money for health care.

Supervisors said the plan probably would be finalized Monday when health care is discussed during two days of budget hearings.

A coalition of health care advocates--physicians, hospitals, senior citizens, community clinics and others who say tobacco funds should go almost entirely to pay for anti-smoking efforts and health care--have submitted more than 115,000 signatures to qualify the measure for the ballot.

The county registrar of voters office is in the process of verifying signatures, but because the group submitted about 44,000 more signatures than needed, registrar Rosalyn Lever said the measure is virtually certain to qualify.

Only a day before the health coalition files its petitions, the board approved Coad’s proposal, an action seen as a last-ditch effort to avoid a contentious election fight.

Many at the meeting two weeks ago thought the 50-50 split would be subject to amendment, even elimination, after one year and that it also would be contingent on the county having enough money to carry out its key objectives of reducing debt and expanding jails.

Coad said Tuesday, however, that the plan she will detail at next week’s budget hearings would initiate reviews only to increase the health care portion, though some individual programs that may not be performing adequately might be dropped in favor of others.

“The monies [for health care] would never would be reduced below 50%,” Coad said.

Under her plan, health care groups would apply to the board or perhaps an advisory commission for funding as if they were applying for a grant, she said. All programs would be required to state specific objectives and have measurable goals.

The initiative, on the other hand, would set specific areas for the spending of the tobacco funds. It would apportion 19% for services to seniors and the disabled, including transportation, long-term care and in-home support; 23% for indigent care by emergency and on-call physicians; 12% for tobacco prevention, anti-addiction and mental health programs; 20% to community, mobile and hospital clinics; 6% to hospitals to fund uncompensated emergency and trauma care and the remaining 20% to law enforcement.

Hospital and physician funds would be spent on existing county programs or according to the percentage of charity care each hospital delivers, said Jon Gilwee, spokesman for Healthcare Assn. of Southern California, a hospital trade group.

Health coalition members said they would expect the supervisors to have a role in allotting the money annually in the other areas and would welcome goals and objectives as part of that criteria.

County officials said the 50-50 split would begin with funds arriving in 2001, because the county already has spent $38 million in tobacco funding from 1999 and 2000 on debt reduction.