August 28, 2025

UHCC Advocates Roundtable: a Meeting of the Minds by HCFA-WA Board Member Marcia Stedman The August 5th Advocates Roundtable marked the first time in the Commission’s nearly 4-year existence that the Universal Health Care Commission engaged directly with universal health care advocates for an...

August 01, 2025

Momentum is Building in Washington!  by HCFA-WA Board Member Marcia Stedman The July 17th Finance Technical Advisory Committee (FTAC) meeting marked the beginning of Washington’s 2025 fiscal year, the end of Health Management Associates’ consultant contract, and stronger participation by all Committee members.  Health...

July 09, 2025

Level Setting at the June UHCC Meeting by Marcia Stedman, HCFA-WA Board Member   The June 11, 2025, UHCC meeting was marked by robust public engagement, technical updates, and next steps for the Commission’s work. A major segment of this meeting consisted of a level-setting...

July 09, 2025

This 15th meeting of the Commission’s Finance Technical Advisory Committee (FTAC) opened with a rich discussion around whether the topic of Governance should be tackled sooner rather than later in the Commission’s Work Plan. Some FTAC members recommended against it, stating that doing so would...

May 07, 2025

By Marcia Stedman, HCFA-WA Board member   This month’s Universal Health Care Commission (UHCC) meeting opened with approving prior meeting minutes and hearing public comments, before launching into a discussion of governance and hearing a report on the baseline modelling of 3 existing insurance...

March 31, 2025

By Marcia Stedman, HCFA-WA Board member   Once again, the lack of clarity about governance was front and center at the recent March FTAC meeting. Coming the day after Oregon's presentation at our 2WSS session on how they are developing their UHC plan and recapped above,...

March 19, 2025

by Ron Lovell Michelle Glass, Policy and advocacy coordinator at the Regional Health Equity Coalition of Southern Oregon outlined the progress and plans of Oregon Universal Health Plan Governance Board (OUHPGB). OUHPGB was formed under Senate Bill 1089 to design a universal healthcare plan...

February 28, 2025

By Marcia Stedman, HCFA-WA Board member  Insurance Commissioner Patty Kuderer pledges strong support for the Universal Health Care Commission and its work: “Healthcare is a human right and getting to Universal coverage is paramount. We at the OIC and myself personally are ready to...

February 07, 2025

As this week the FTAC was all about budget I thought it may be useful to have a short intro to global budgets.  What is a global budget? Hospitals with global budgets get paid a set amount to treat a group of patients over...

December 20, 2024

In the bleak midwinter, glimmers of light at the December UHCC Meeting   By Marcia Stedman  In this season of darkness, FTAC member Bob Murray brought welcome light to the Commission’s December meeting.   Bob was the executive director of Maryland’s hospital rate-setting system and gave...