Ortego has introduced legislation that if passed would create a formal partnership between LPSS and UMC Hospital. The goals of the partnership are outlined in House Bill 867 as follows:
1. To provide primary care services to students and their family members such that avoidable emergency department utilization is reduced and reliance on costly treatments for preventable conditions diminishes in the community.
2. To provide incentives which facilitate greater involvement on the part of parents and other family members in the education of children.
3. To transition the overall care model of a charity hospital to one which features an increased level of preventive care and treatment delivered in schools and other community-based settings by the hospital and its community partners.
4. To optimize Medicaid federal financial participation through provision of primary care.
5. To adapt successfully to systemic health policy changes during and pursuant to implementation of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in a manner which maximizes health benefits to children and families.
6. To design its system of services in such a manner as to facilitate replication of the program by partnerships among other hospitals and schools of this state.
“Dr. Cooper has already proven that comprehensive school reform is best achieved through a truly comprehensive health and wellness model in public schools,” Ortego says in a press release announcing the legislation. “It may also be a great fit for our LSU hospital system which already specializes in caring for the communities that need it the most.”
If successful, Ortego would like to see the partnerships and school wellness models spread statewide, though his primary goal is to help Cooper on a local level, he says. Lafayette Parish is the largest school district in which Cooper has tried his wellness model, Ortego says.
“The results of these previous programs have been highly successful and include increases in attendance rates, graduation rates and test scores,” according to the release from Ortego. “At the same time crime in the communities went down, child obesity rates dropped and teen pregnancy declined. The model demonstrates children who are healthy in mind and body can effectively learn in public schools under this approach.”
The announcement from Ortego also leaves its recipients with a subtle hint on where Ortego may stand on Gov. Bobby Jindal’s proposal to overhaul public education, a four-bill legislative package that teachers unions and other critics decry as an attack on public education.
“Our focus needs to be on fixing our failing public schools in Louisiana rather than writing them off,” Ortego says in the press release.
In a phone interview Friday morning, Ortego tells The Ind that his comment doesn’t commit his vote one way or the other on Jindal’s plan, but rather asserts that “we’re not really looking at the heart of the problems” in public education. Ortego also notes that Jindal’s education reform bills will be heard through the House Education Committee, while Ortego’s bill will first go through the House Health and Welfare Committee.
“This is comprehensive education reform that is based on the principle that children can learn in our public schools if given the opportunity. Access to a school-based health and wellness program is proven to give that opportunity,” he says.
MAY 24 Blogger Robert Mann posts this entry about the Baton Rouge Chamber's recent report on Louisiana's higher education system. It's critical to economic development, and yet our system is facing a "funding crisis" with no way to resolve it, the report says. The Chamber says control of tuition and fees must be returned to the higher ed governing boards.
MAY 24 Here's a NBC33 story about Tyrann Mathieu. He has signed with the Arizona Cardinals, inking a $3 million, four-year deal. He gets a signing bonus of $265K, but gets another, larger bonus if he doesn't get cut from the team for doing drugs. The deal reportedly includes mandatory tests and meetings for the player.
MAY 24 Jarvis DeBerry posts here about the redonkulus rhetoric that would have us believe NOLA is a safe city with a murder problem. Maybe the city's crime stats don't compare with its murder stats because you can't manipulate a murder, he says: a dead body's a dead body. It just doesn't make sense, he says, and his readers agree: a poll asks if they believe the city is safe, and more than 90 percent say no.
MAY 24 Jindal administration officials announced Thursday that the privatization of public health care is going to cost a lot more than they budgeted for, the Advocate reports here. "I'm so surprised," said no one. Anywhere. The cost they're projecting now is more than $1 billion - a lot more than the $626 million budgeted for it. And, it's more than it cost the state to operate those hospitals. So why are we doing this again?
MAY 24 Blogger CB Forgotston ridicules the recent PR campaign by the state GOP in the wake of a legislative auditor's request to both major parties. The GOP (apparently unaware that the Dems got the same request) started yammering about being targeted because it had "killed" a tax increase. CB finds that laughable, but it's also pretty funny that the GOP was comparing this episode to the IRS scandal (Because the President has so much to do with our state auditor. Right?).
MAY 24 Politico details some recent fund-raising efforts by Sen. David Vitter, which have raised the question of his future political plans. This time, it is a $5,000 per head "bayou weekend" that includes "Cajun cooking" and an all-caps "alligator hunt," the story reports. Funds raised go to a super PAC that can spend money to support Vitter in federal or state races, the story points out.
MAY 24 The pink building on Royal in the quarter was sold at a sheriff's sale Thursday, this Picayune story reports. An injunction that would have halted the sale wasn't enforced because the family failed to post a $150,000 bond, the story reports. So the owner of the mortgages on the building bought it, for nearly $7 million. Now the feuding family will have to negotiate with that company to get a lease on the building that has housed their business for close to 60 years.
MAY 23 This post in Louisiana Voice tells us about a bill by a Winnsboro lege that would require all public high school students to take at least one Course Choice online class in order to graduate. (What?) Blogger Tom Aswell says it's a monument to "waste and corruption," especially in light of the problems he's exposed with the program in recent weeks. Idaho had a similar program, but voters removed it by a 2-1 margin, Aswell says.
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