AARP Commends Iowa Leaders for Putting People Before Politics

With the July 1 enactment of the Iowa Health and Wellness Plan/Senate File 446 expanding access to affordable health care for all Iowans, more than 150,000 Iowans without health care coverage will have the security of knowing they can get the health care they need.

"AARP applauds the work of our bipartisan leaders for their efforts to forge a final compromise solution to expand health care coverage for those Iowans who are currently without accessible health care, especially for then more than 17,000 Iowans age 50-64 who are either between jobs or in jobs without health coverage," said AARP Iowa State Director Kent Sovern.

"We thank all the lawmakers who put people before politics and voted for this final plan, and we thank Governor Branstad for listening to the concerns of AARP Iowa members and the more than 60 Iowa organizations who supported this legislation, said Sovern, and we invite Iowans to join us in thanking our state leaders for their work."

Please click here to email a "thank you" to your legislators who voted for the Iowa Health and Wellness Plan.

In addition to the new plan for covering Iowa’s working poor, passage of SF 446 included funding for direct program support for older Iowans.  The legislation restores $600,000 in funding for the Iowa Department on Aging/Iowa Area Agencies on Aging for home and community based services for older Iowans and provides an additional $250,000 to the agencies to address Iowa’s long-term care unmet needs, including in-home service help for the needy.

To learn more about these programs and AARP's work during the 2013 Iowa Legislative Session, tune into a conversation between Sovern and AARP Iowa Associate State Director for Advocacy Anthony Carroll at www.youtube.com/aarpiowa.