Marvelous Marin Hosts
State-Wide meeting of Gray Panthers Networks
On Saturday, September 8, the Marin Gray Panthers network welcomed representatives from Berkeley, Sacramento, San Francisco, Contra Costa, and, from Southern California, Long Beach and South Bay Gray Panthers networks to the quarterly state meeting. The “state of the state” membership and activities included a report from Joan and Margie (Sacramento) on the revival of the Santa Barbara network. Michael Lyon, Kay Walker, GeorgeBuffington, Aroza Simpson and Mitzi Raas attended from San Francisco.
Copies of the networks’ activities and legislative summaries are in the office for your perusal.
On the national Gray Panthers scene: The web site, www.graypanthers.org, is up and running, invites your attention and participation and would like your e-mail address. The next priority for the national office is health care, for the promotion of which they have a $100,000 gift. And there will be a NATIONAL CONVENTION on September 28-30, 2008, in Detroit. National conventions decide on policies and priorities to guide the programs of individual networks. The California networks have around $5,000 left from the Wellness Foundation grant, and it was decided to use those funds to help defray expenses of delegates to the convention.
The afternoon session discussed health care, the status of SB 840 and its financing companion bill SB 1014, and the drive to pass some form of AB 8 (Nunez), which mandates universal coverage through insurance companies. The Gray Panthers along with the CARA, California Nurses Association (CNA), the California School Employees Association, One Care Now, and the Older Women's League (OWL) stand firm in support of SB 840. The Wellness Foundation has extended its previous two-year grant through 2010. For us that means $34,000 in 2008, $28,000 in 2009 and $24,000 in 2010, to be used for organization-building to provide a grassroots stake in health care reform.
The next quarterly meeting will be in Sacramento in January.