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APHA Legislative Update

April 2006

As you know, it is National Public Health Week! This year’s theme is "Designing Healthy Communities, Raising Healthy Kids," and our campaign is focused on the link between children’s health and the built environment.

To kick off this year’s National Public Health Week, APHA sponsored a luncheon briefing on Capitol Hill on Monday. Nearly 200 people attended the briefing, including Congressional staff, reporters and organizational partners.

A Kaiser Family Foundation webcast of the briefing is available for viewing here: http://www.kaisernetwork.org/health_cast/hcast_index.cfm?display=detail&hc=1695.

We were pleased to have actor and activist Edward Norton address the audience and bring his star power to the event, raising the profile of the issue. Additional speakers included APHA Executive Director Dr. Georges Benjamin, APHA President Dr. Pat Mail, Senator Obama’s Health and Education Advisor Dora Hughes, M.D., MPH, and representatives from each of the five blue ribbon communities, receiving honors from APHA for their work that improved their own built environments and the health of the children in their community.

A National Public Health Week advocacy page has been created to help direct this week’s advocacy campaigns. The advocacy page contains links to action alerts to contact members of Congress on many of the diverse issues touched by children's health and the built environment—including asthma rates, the safe routes to school program, reauthorization of Hope VI (which funds revitalization of housing projects), and so forth. Please participate in this campaign by visiting the National Public Health Week advocacy page and clicking on the action alerts to contact your members of Congress on these important issues. The advocacy page is available here: http://www.apha.org/nphw/2006/pg_advocacy.htm.

Among our list of advocacy alerts for our campaign, we are proud to report that Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) and Representative Hilda Solis (D-CA) have introduced the "Healthy Places Act" in the Senate and House of Representatives. APHA staff worked with the Senator's staff on the introduction of this bill, which takes a broad look at built environment and health issues by bringing together all levels of government to these issues by:

• establishing and supporting health impact assessment programs to proactively examine the potential health effects of major policy or programmatic changes;
• creating a grant program to assist states and local communities to address environmental health hazards,particularly those that contribute to health disparities;
• accelerating research on the relationship between the environment and health.

Also this week, APHA Executive Director Dr. Georges Benjamin participated in a Kaiser Family Foundation "Ask The Experts" panel discussion on children's heath and health disparities. A Kaiser Family Foundation webcast of the panel is available for viewing here: http://www.kaisernetwork.org/health_cast/hcast_index.cfm?display=detail&hc=1693.

Thanks for your participation in National Public Health Week!

The Senate recently restored more than $7 billion in cuts to vital health and education programs, including the important public health programs that Americans rely on. The bipartisan 73-27 vote was a clear message to fund public health. Now the House of Representatives is debating their version of the Congressional budget resolution, which creates the blueprint for how the federal government will allocate resources next year. The funding level currently in the House's version of the budget resolution is insufficient to adequately fund all of the public health agencies and programs that are important to Americans.

During the next day or two, the House of Representatives plans to debate and vote on their version of the budget resolution. We need your help to ensure an adequate funding level in the health portion of the budget. Contact your Representative to tell them to vote for sufficient public health funding. Click here to send your Representative a message to vote for public health: http://www.capwiz.com/apha/issues/alert/?alertid=8531686.

On March 30, 2006, APHA Executive Director Dr. Georges Benjamin testified in front of the House Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations Subcommittee about funding for the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA). Representing the Friends of HRSA, a coalition of more than 100 organizations supporting HRSA funding, Dr. Benjamin described the potential harm that would be caused by the President’s proposed HRSA budget cuts. Dr. Benjamin urged Representative Ralph Regula (R-OH), chairman of the subcommittee, to restore cuts that have already occurred at HRSA, and to reject the President’s proposal for more cuts. The Friends of HRSA testimony is online here:

http://www.apha.org/legislative/legislative/032706FriendsofHRSALaborHTestimonyFY07.pdf

Have cuts in funding to CDC, HRSA or another agency of the Public Health Service affected your job, program or your capacity to deliver essential public health services? If so, e-mail your real-life example to grassroots@apha.org. Examples that are received may be used in advocacy and policy materials with the aim of protecting public health funding this year from further cuts.

In addition to the work we’ve been doing on the above topics, APHA has been active with other public health issues of importance:

§ APHA testimony submitted to the House Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations Subcommittee regarding the fiscal year 2007 public health budget (March 31, 2006)

§ CDC Coalition testimony submitted to the House Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations Subcommittee regarding fiscal year 2007 funding for the CDC (March 31, 2006)

§ Letter to Senators Urging Support of the Specter-Harkin Amendment to Increased Funding for Public Health and Education in the Fiscal Year 2007 Budget Resolution (March 14, 2006)

§ Letter in Support of S. 2305 Regarding New Medicaid Citizenship Verification Requirements (March 7, 2006)

§ Letter to House and Senate Budget Committee Members in Support of Increased Funding for Public Health in the Fiscal Year 2007 Budget (March 2, 2006)

Contact * APHA HomeAPHA 800 I Street NW, Washington DC 20001202-777-APHA (tel) * 202-777-2534 (fax) * comments@apha.org