Category: Kathryn Koch
Courtney Speaks Out on Expansion of Children’s Health Insurance
SCHIP
The Day
Katie Koch
Boston University Washington News Service
2/4/09
[TO BE ADDED TO WIRE COPY BY EDITORS AT THE DAY]
“We are going to move forward as a country towards universal health coverage,” Rep. Joe Courtney, D-2nd District, said on the House floor. “Today will go down in history as an important step forward to accomplish that much-needed goal.”
Under the new law, the expanded program will insure 24,700 new children in Connecticut, according to a Congressional Research Service report.
That would reduce the number of uninsured children in the state—58,000 by one estimate—by 43 percent. That is slightly less than the 47 percent reduction nationwide that the report predicts.
Courtney said legislation for expanding children’s health insurance, which President George W. Bush vetoed twice in the fall of 2007, was long overdue.
“It’s a real validation of the change that took place in the November election that within two weeks we’re able to have a new administration finally get this issue resolved,” he said in an interview.
The program is aimed at children whose parents earn too much for Medicaid eligibility but not enough to pay for private health insurance.
Connecticut families may receive coverage under the law’s provisions if they earn no more than 300 percent of the poverty level. In past debates, some outside lawmakers criticized the threshold as too lenient, but many argued it was necessary because of Connecticut’s relatively high cost of living.
Courtney said the new law will lock in the current level required to receive coverage under Healthcare for Uninsured Kids and Youth, Connecticut’s subsidized health insurance program partially funded by the federal program.
The law also will expand dental coverage, raising the reimbursement rate for dentists who take on HUSKY patients to the rate the state employees’ health plan pays.
“You’re [no longer] going to have a situation where dentists refuse patients because they’re being paid at Medicaid rates, which were a disgrace,” Courtney said.
A 2006 study commissioned by the Connecticut Department of Social Services found that only 27 percent of frequent callers were able to obtain routine dental appointments for HUSKY children.
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Lieberman, Courtney Address Sec. Gates’ Remarks on Defense Spending
DEFENSE
The Day
Katie Koch
Boston University Washington News Service
1/27/09
WASHINGTON – Defense Secretary Robert Gates told Congress Tuesday that one of his major goals is to fix the “long-standing systemic problems” in how the government acquires military goods and services with taxpayer dollars—a process that for years has brought billions of dollars in defense spending to Eastern Connecticut.
In separate hearings by the Senate and House Armed Services Committees, Gates said this was his next most important priority after stabilizing Iraq and Afghanistan.
Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-Conn.), a member of the Senate committee, and Rep. Joe Courtney (D-2nd District), who serves on the House committee, attended the hearings, which were meant to set the tone for the new Congress.
“Many programs that cost more than anticipated are built on an inadequate initial foundation,” Gates said at the Senate hearing.
He criticized the Department of Defense for its “entrenched attitudes,” including resistance to change, factional in-fighting and focus on parochial interests. He called for increased competition and better use of technology to ensure that all defense spending projects are pursued fairly and wisely.
At the Senate hearing, Lieberman questioned Gates about his attitudes toward new defense investments, which Connecticut politicians hope will spur economic growth in the region. The Day reported Sunday that Camp Rell in Niantic and the Naval Submarine Base in Groton will receive a combined $163.95 million for construction projects, while Electric Boat in Groton landed a $14 billion contract with the Navy last December.
“My interest [is] in having the Defense Department review some programs—defense acquisitions that we’re going to have to make in the next five years, let’s say—and see if we can accelerate any of them to this year as part of the economic stimulus,” Lieberman said. He said these programs, much like the infrastructure projects the new administration wants to speed up, would create jobs and be consistent with national goals.
Gates said that the White House had already asked the Department of Defense for a list of “shovel-ready” defense projects, including military hospitals, barracks and clinics.
Courtney, who attended the House hearing later in the day, said Gates’s analysis impressed him.
“He’s absolutely right that the system needs to be reformed,” Courtney said in an interview. “I think to a large degree it’s a negative legacy of the Rumsfeld era. He really just pretty much handed over the whole area [of defense acquisitions] to private contractors.”
Both congressmen said they largely exempted Electric Boat’s new contract to build Virginia-class submarines for the Navy from their criticisms.
“I am not afraid of scrutiny being given to the Virginia-class program,” Courtney said. “At the end of the day, the Virginia-class program has really earned its place in the Navy’s plans, because they really had to go through a pretty wrenching process of bringing down costs.”
“Electric Boat is probably the best example in the country of a defense contractor that has worked well with the Defense Department to bring the cost of a major project…down substantially,” Lieberman said in an interview.
Lieberman said his goals for procuring defense spending for Connecticut did not conflict with Gates’s call for better procurement processes.
“If you have better acquisition you’re actually going to be able to acquire more defense systems because you won’t waste money,” he said. “You’ll be able to spend every dollar and get something for it.”
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Oakdale Native Among Coast Guard Cadets in Inaugural Parade
CADETS
The Day
Katie Koch
Boston University Washington News Service
1/20/09
WASHINGTON – Nearly 90 cadets from the U.S. Coast Guard Academy marched in Tuesday’s inaugural parade, and Oakdale native and third-class cadet Richard Kyle Coleman was excited to be among them.
“It was pretty exhilarating, actually,” said Coleman, 20, a graduate of Montville High School. “It went by really fast.”
The cadets spent many hours preparing for their brief moment before the new President. They gathered at 2 a.m. Tuesday to take a bus from the Naval Academy, in Annapolis, Md., where they stayed Monday night, and spent most of the day practicing and waiting to step off.
The Coast Guard didn’t begin to march until dusk and finished the parade route at about 6:30 p.m. They went directly to another bus, which they took in order to arrive home in time for classes today.
While marching, the cadets got to stop in front of the White House and turn “eyes left” to Barack Obama, who saluted them.
“I really didn’t get into the election because I figured I’m going to be taking orders no matter what. I support the president, and that’s my responsibility,” Coleman said.
But, he said, marching in the parade left a more distinct impression of what the next four years will be like.
“I felt a lot of hope and pride for what was happening,” he said. “It makes me hopeful that everyone else is so hopeful.”
Third-class cadet Brian Bonomi, 19, of Cooper City, Fla., said the crowd’s good will extended beyond the new President.
“Every time they announced our service and what we do, the crowd would cheer us, and it was like, wow,” Bonomi said. “It kind of restored my pride in what we do.”
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Locals With Inauguration Tickets Find ‘Winning the Lottery’ is a Relative Term
B-MATTER
The Day
Katie Koch
Boston University Washington News Service
1/20/09
WASHINGTON – For the lucky few from Connecticut who managed to obtain tickets for the presidential inauguration of Barack Obama, it was like winning the lottery. Getting there, however, was another story.
From long lines to a stolen purse to having nowhere to stay in the capital, Nutmeggers who received the coveted tickets from their members of Congress faced many hurdles this week. But in the end, they agreed, witnessing history in the making was well worth the effort.
The hassle started Monday morning, when congressional offices opened to the public so that ticket-lottery winners could pick up their passes to the inauguration. From 9 a.m. into the evening, lines stretched around every entrance to the House and Senate office buildings, said Brian Farber, communications director for Rep. Joe Courtney, D-2nd District.
“We started to get calls from constituents who were out waiting for a very long time, so we started delivering the tickets to them in the lines,” Farber said.
Tami Patterson of Norwich, who campaigned for Obama and Courtney last fall, received a call from Courtney’s office in December saying she had won two standing-room tickets for the Capitol grounds.
“I couldn’t believe it, out of all the people,” Patterson said. “I was ecstatic; I started crying.”
Her plans soon hit a speed bump when she realized she and her son, Ryan Parker, would have nowhere to stay. Out of desperation, she visited Obama’s Web site and posted her dilemma on a community message board. Luckily, a couple in the area responded, offering her and Parker a room in their Virginia home Monday night.
“I was prepared to stay in my car,” she said.
Erin Foley-Machnik of Niantic thought the trip down to the inauguration would go relatively smoothly. She and her mother, Denise Foley of Waterford, planned to stay with relatives in Loudoun County, Va. Both are recovering from recent surgeries—spinal fusion for Foley-Machnik, a knee replacement for her mother—but Foley-Macknik said the historic occasion was worth a risky trip.
After hours of standing in crowds, Foley-Machnik was leaving the National Mall yesterday afternoon following the inauguration when she realized her purse had been stolen. It contained not just her wallet, cash and Metro card, but her prescription pain medication as well. Surrounded by thousands of spectators jammed in shoulder-to-shoulder, she was unable to find the thief.
“The police officer that I went to said, ‘I wish there was something I could do,’” she said.
Beth Blackketter of Warren drove down to stay with her brother and sister-in-law in Millersville, Md., after winning tickets through the office of Rep. Christopher Murphy, D-5th District.
“My brother dropped us off four blocks from the Capitol,” Blackketter said. “We thought we were golden.”
Over three hours later, she and her sister-in-law Gretchen Bandy finally made it into their ticketed area, just behind the Capitol reflecting pool.
Despite the long lines and chilly temperatures, the two remained in high spirits. They huddled together, arms around one another, and took pictures of the scene as the new President spoke.
“Today’s all about the accomplishment of getting him here, uniting the country and celebrating this historic event,” Blackketter said.
Foley-Machnik said she was inspired by Obama’s inaugural address.
“It was hard to hear the speech where we were, but everything he said was extremely passionate and…full of hope,” she said. “The point that we’re not done yet, we have a lot of work to do, a lot of sacrifices to make, stuck out.
“At the end of the day, we still have to go home and stick together.”
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For Connecticut College Student, a Long Journey From Colombia to the Inauguration
Photos by Caroline Bridges
FELFLE
New London Day
Katie Koch
Boston University Washington News Service
Jan. 18, 2009
WASHINGTON – It took Alexandra Felfle nearly two days to travel from her hometown of Barranquilla, Colombia, to the Hilton Washington. Still, she arrived at the hotel Saturday smiling and poised, ready to witness the inauguration of Barack Obama.
Add to that her flawless English, and it was easy to forget how far the Connecticut College junior had come for this week’s University Presidential Inaugural Conference. That is, until she saw an old friend from her first trip to the States, and the two young women erupted in laughter and frenzied Spanish, her native language.
It was a long-awaited reunion for Felfle, who first visited Washington in 2005 as the only foreign student to receive a scholarship to the Global Young Leaders Conference. Early last year that program’s sponsor, the Congressional Youth Leadership Council, invited Felfle to the special 2009 university inauguration conference. After months of fundraising, she’s finally in town for Tuesday’s festivities.
Of the 5,000 college students attending this week’s conference, only 495 are international, according to program spokesperson Carmen McClaskey. Nearly all the participants are alumni of Congressional Youth Leadership Council programs.
As part of the conference, Felfle will hear speakers such as Colin Powell and Al Gore, watch the inauguration from the Mall and attend a black-tie gala for the program’s students at the National Air and Space Museum downtown. She also will get the chance to discuss politics and ideas with like-minded young people from around the world.
The logistics of Felfle’s trip weren’t easy. Her parents paid for her plane ticket to Washington from Barranquilla, where she spent her winter break, but she had to come up with the conference fees herself.
“I thought, either I need to get a scholarship, I need to work, or I need to find a way to do this,” she recalled.
As it turned out, Connecticut College stepped in to help Felfle, the first international student at the college to serve as a class president.
“The day she got the letter, she talked to me and we kind of set out a game plan for her and who she should approach,” Cheryl Banker, Felfle’s career counselor at Connecticut College, said. “She wrote letters, did all the solicitation. She went after it.”
Over the next several months, Felfle raised nearly $3,000 from 11 different departments and administrators at the university, including college President Leo I. Higdon Jr.
“Her accomplishments enrich us all, and the support she received from so many people and departments across campus is a strong reflection of the pride we have in her,” Higdon said in a statement to The Day.
Even before her door-to-door campaign, Felfle had become a familiar face to the deans and counselors at the school as a “very enthusiastic freshman,” according to Mary Devins, associate director of the college’s Toor Cummings Center for International Studies and the Liberal Arts.
“I said to her, ‘You go for it, girlfriend, I’ll give you some money,’” Devins said.
In exchange for the financial boost, Felfle will give a presentation on her inauguration experience at Connecticut College on Feb. 13. She also hopes to gain extra perspective on America’s economic relationship with Colombia, which will be the focus of her senior thesis in economics and international relations.
Although she couldn’t vote in November’s elections, Felfle closely followed both candidates’ positions on foreign aid and trade. A country long plagued by drug trafficking and guerrilla warfare, Colombia is one of the top ten recipients of American foreign aid. It also relies on free trade to keep its economy afloat, Felfle said.
While taking classes at Georgetown University’s Semester in Washington Program in the fall, she became an advocate of free trade between her native and adopted countries. She said she is curious to see what policies Barack Obama will pursue and if he will address Colombia in his speech on Tuesday.
“Globalization is a boat you want to jump on,” she said. “It’s not positive right away, and it will take some time…but I think Obama changed his mind [about a U.S.–Colombia trade agreement] because he saw what good it could do for the country.”
Armando Bengochea, dean of the college community and one of the donors to Felfle’s trip, said her studied attitude toward international cooperation is evident in her work on campus.
“She strikes me as a true believer in globalism as distinct from globalization, who’s interested in solidarity between people and governments,” Bengochea said. “She’s someone who tries to build bridges.”
Like most of the millions coming to Washington this week, Felfle said she feels a personal connection to the new president that will make her trip even more memorable.
“In a weird way I relate to him, especially to his dad coming to the U.S. to go to school,” Felfle said. “He’s a fighter. He got everything in life based on his intelligence, and I admire that.”
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New London Mayor Excited to Attend Obama’s Swearing-In
MAYOR
The Day
Katie Koch
Boston University Washington News Service
1/16/09
WASHINGTON – Hundreds of the nation’s mayors will descend on Washington this weekend for the annual winter meeting of the United States Conference of Mayors. New London’s mayor, the Rev. Wade A. Hyslop Jr., will be among them but he’s less interested in attending lectures and panel discussions than in witnessing the main event.
“Obviously, the most exciting, important thing is to see the inauguration of the 44th president,” Hyslop said with a laugh.
Hyslop will fly into Baltimore on Monday morning. He plans to stay with his son, Army Sgt. Maj. Bertram Vaughan, who works at the Pentagon and lives in nearby College Park, Md. They have seats to watch Barack Obama’s swearing-in ceremony on Tuesday.
This inauguration holds special meaning for Hyslop. The mayor, who is pastor of Trinity Missionary Baptist Church, said he helped organize in the early 1970s one of the first parades honoring Martin Luther King Jr.
“I have always been an avid supporter and follower of Martin Luther King,” Hyslop said. “Looking at one of his dreams coming to fruition is one of most significant things you can see.”
Before he leaves on Friday, Hyslop hopes to spend time with his son, meet with Sen. Chris Dodd and Rep. Joe Courtney, D-2nd District, and possibly attend the mayors’ conference.
Hyslop said he isn’t worried about the record turnout predicted for Tuesday.
“It’ll probably be a madhouse down there, but also a time when people are going to be jubilant about just being in the crowd,” he said. “I’m just looking forward to finding some camaraderie with people.”
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