Seward Challenger Don Barber & Healthcare Reformer Mark Dunlea
to speak at Oneonta Town Hall on Healthcare

Don Barber, the Democrat who is challenging State Senator James Seward for his 51st District seat, will join leading NY healthcare reformer Mark Dunlea at Oneonta Town Hall on Wednesday, May 28 at 7:00 pm. The topic: how to win major healthcare reform in New York State. Senator Seward has also been invited to take part in the discussion.

"The healthcare system is in need of a dramatic overhaul that will result in a system that provides quality, affordable healthcare for everyone, " says farmer, businessman, and six-term Caroline Town Supervisor Don Barber. Barber charges that Sen. Seward, who chairs the Senate's Insurance Committee, has been an obstacle to major reform. Barber supports creating a universal public health insurance system that would cover all New Yorkers. Senator Seward has said he does not.

"New York’s taxpayers, consumers and employers spend far too much money on a healthcare system that leaves millions uninsured or with inadequate coverage," says Dunlea, the Albany-based executive director of Hunger Action Network of New York. Dunlea has been a leading fighter for national health insurance and for a statewide system of universal public insurance. "A single-payer health care system will save significant sums – far more than other approaches – while doing the best job in ensuring 100% healthcare coverage," he says.

Both Barber and Dunlea also support a bill, now stalled in Senator Seward's Insurance Committee, that would require insurance companies to get approval for premium rate hikes and that would limit how much they can spend on administration. The bill will die in June if it does not get voted out of the committee.

The event is sponsored by the Healthcare Work Group of the Coalition for Democracy of Central New York, a volunteer group with members from Otsego, Chenango, and Delaware Counties. For more information about the group, email: healthcaremessenger@gmail.org.

Oneonta Town Hall is located on State Highway 23 in West Oneonta.

For more information about this event, contact Paddy Lane at grodlane@frontiernet.net or 607-263-5817.

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updated 5/24/08