To: Colorado Health Champions, c/o Ken Connell, ColoradoCare Initiative#20 Organizer and MoveOn.org Denver-Metro Council, ColoradoCare Initiative#20 Organizer

GET HEALTHIER COLORADO! . . . GET ColoradoCare* Initiative#20 PETITION SIGNATURES IN 2015 SO IT C...

PLEASE ACCEPT MY PLEDGE TO HELP COLLECT PETITION SIGNATURES IN 2015 . . . SO I CAN VOTE FOR ColoradoCare Initiative#20 IN 2016!!! Petition by Ken Connell

To be delivered to Colorado Health Champions and the MoveOn.org Denver-Metro Council in order to strengthen their ColoradoCare Initiative#20 signature collection efforts in support of the ColoradoCareYES.co (not .com) ballot initiative campaign throughout the summer of 2015.

"YES!" -- PLEASE ACCEPT MY PLEDGE TO HELP COLLECT (~100,000 in total) VALID, VOTER SIGNATURES IN COLORADO BEFORE OCTOBER, 2015 . . . SO I CAN VOTE FOR APPROVING 'UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE' FOR ALL COLORADO RESIDENTS IN THE NEXT PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION IN NOVEMBER, 2016 . . . AS DETAILED IN ColoradoCare Inititive#20 . . .

Why is this important?

IT'S ABOUT OUR Health and Our Health Care in Colorado! And, we want to VOTE FOR the ColoradoCare* Initiative#20 in November 2016! We need affordable, quality health care for all Coloradans! We need it now! We cannot wait! . . . *(previously known as the "Colorado Health Care Cooperative") . . .
TWO YEARS AGO, starting in May of 2013, over 700 Coloradans, yourself included, signed our petition stating: "VOTE FOR the Colorado Health Care Cooperative in 2013!!!" When you signed this petition in 2013, your signing was communicated to your state elected officials, including Governor John Hickenlooper, and members of the Colorado State House and Senate. Our intent was to have the State Legislature refer the "Cooperative" to the November State ballot that year so all registered voters could make the decision for/against universal health care in Colorado.
WE SAID: As my Colorado Senator or Representative, I’m asking you to VOTE to send the Colorado Health Care Cooperative to the voters of Colorado as a referred measure on November 5, 2013.” We added: “It’s our Health and our Health Care! We Coloradans have the right to make the decision for ourselves at the ballot box!” We further declared: “It’s about our Health and our Health Care in Colorado! And, we want to VOTE FOR the Colorado Health Care Cooperative in November 2013! We need affordable, quality health care for all Coloradans NOW! Let us vote! Let us decide! We need it now! We cannot wait!”
EVEN BEFORE THAT, in late 2011 through early 2013, many of us, including you possibly, over 1450 Coloradans, signed an earlier petition stating: "We need affordable, quality health care for all Coloradans! We need it now! We cannot wait!" This earlier petition also went to the same set of decision-makers in Colorado, and was delivered personally to Governor Hickenlooper's office, while our elected representatives in the State House and Senate were notified by emails.
BOTTOM LINE RESULTS ACHIEVED SO FAR (as I see it) were that . . . The Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) was affirmatively accepted in Colorado, and despite some strong opposition, Colorado created its own marketplace, known as a State Exchange, and accepted Medicaid expansion even though the U.S. Supreme Court made the Medicaid expansion "voluntary" for states in June 2012. So far, Colorado's "uninsured rate" has fallen from ~17% to ~11% . . . so I would argue that Colorado very much still needs what our earlier petitions have been asking for and seeking to promote as a unique, Colorado solution . . . Everyone covered . . . Billions of dollars saved . . . Comprehensive health prevention and health care benefits . . . In the ColoradoCare Health Plan now referred to as ColoradoCare Initiative#20 . . . Designed in Colorado for a healthier Colorado . . .
LESSONS LEARNED: It’s up to us, the citizens and registered voters of Colorado, to make this happen . . . so now in 2015, it’s past time for us to do what needs to be done to GET OUR VOTE FOR the ColoradoCare Initiative#20 in November, 2016 . . . Gather ~100,000 valid voter petition signatures by October, 2015 . . . This really is up to us! . . . To do! . . . or not . . . That is TODAY'S BIG QUESTION! . . .