Officials Propose Tobacco Fund Ordinance

Hoping to blunt support for Measure O, some county supervisors now say the best way to convince voters that they will use $260 million in tobacco money for health care is to pass an ordinance requiring it.

Supervisor Kathy Long said Friday she supports the idea of adopting an ordinance to mandate the money be used only for health care. Supervisor Frank Schillo said he likes the idea.

Long’s comments came in response to a plan floated by her political opponent, Mike Morgan, who seeks to unseat her in November’s supervisorial election.

Morgan suggests the Board of Supervisors devise a fair way to support the Ventura County Medical Center, while sharing a portion of the money with the county’s private hospitals. The formula should be based on which hospitals treat the most uninsured and indigent patients, he said.

And Morgan wants supervisors to pass an ordinance requiring all tobacco money received in the future to be used for health care. Supervisors have said they will use the money--more than $10 million a year for the next 25 years--for health care, but have not passed an ordinance requiring it.

Despite agreeing with the idea of an ordinance, Long called Morgan’s proposal a “day late and a dollar short.”

Long said supervisors had earlier discussed sharing tobacco funds with the private hospitals before Measure O was proposed. The initiative, sponsored by Community Memorial Hospital, would wrest the $260 million from the county and give it to eight local, private hospitals. The initiative would provide no money to the county hospital.

“I think we will pass an ordinance,” said Long, who chairs of the board. “It’s the surest way to protect the funds.”

But she said it would be wiser to pass an ordinance to last five years and then revisit the issue to determine what new health care requirements have arisen. Long said tying up the lawsuit settlement money for use in health care was not a problem, because of the diverse number of health care problems that need to be addressed.

Last January, during debates on the best use for the tobacco money, Long expressed reservations about an ordinance that would dictate in advance how the money is spent.

“If we are going to start to segment our budget by passing ordinances, it gets to be very convoluted and unnecessary,” she said at the time.

Schillo, who backs Morgan’s candidacy, said he favors sharing the money with local hospitals. But like Long, he would prefer to limit the requirement to five years.

“We don’t know what our needs will be like down the road,” Schillo said. “But I like the ordinance idea and the public likes it.”

Supporters of Measure O frequently point out that the supervisors talk a lot about using the money for health care but have offered no guarantees they will do so.

Mark Barnhill, a spokesman for Community Memorial, said that if the county wants an ordinance guaranteeing that funds go toward health care then it should support Measure O.

Supervisor John Flynn said he did not object to sharing the tobacco funds with the area’s private hospitals, but he didn’t think an ordinance specifying how the money would be spent is necessary.

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Supervisor Judy Mikels called Morgan’s plan an oversimplified response to a extremely complex problem. Passing an ordinance, she said, would be an empty and meaningless gesture, because a future board could vote to overturn it.

“To oversimplify something so you can look good or sound good is detrimental to everyone and makes liars out of us if we can’t follow through on it,” Mikels said.

And given the publicity surrounding the issue, she said there is no way supervisors would use the money for anything other than health care.

“The board will never be able to take this money and fix potholes with it,” Mikels said.

Critics say the county can’t be trusted with the money, pointing out that supervisors spent the first $3 million the county received paying off fines for overbilling Medicare patients.

Morgan said his plan would ensure the county could not backtrack on promises to fund health care programs.

“I think an ordinance is better, because it is stronger than a resolution,” said Morgan, who is vice-mayor of Camarillo.

Morgan has not taken a public position on Measure O, but he said that if his ideas were adopted he would oppose the initiative.

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David Maron, who heads a citizens group called the Coalition Against Measure O, said he too expects the county to honor its pledge to use the money for health care, but right now the important thing is defeating the initiative.

“Morgan is getting ahead of himself. First, we have to defeat Measure O; then we can discuss these ideas,” Maron said. “We have to prevent this money from disappearing into a black hole. Morgan should be working to defeat Measure O.”

FYI

To access an online discussion about Measure O, visit https://www.latimes.com/editions/ventura.