Friday, March 15, 2013

Proposed Board Agenda March 21, 2013

Board meetings are held at the Co-op's downtown business office at 610 Columbia St. Members are welcome to attend.



Proposed Board Agenda for March 21, 2013 6:30-9:30 pm


Agenda Item
Action
Time
Announcements

share
2 min
Mission Statement & Commitments Review

share
3 min
Member Comment

listen
10 min
Staff report

listen
5 min
Membership Database and Point-of-Sale Merge
We have an opportunity to merge our membership database with our new POS system. What should the process for considering this option include?
feedback
30 min
Garden Center Business Plan
Shall we open a Garden Center at the Little House property?
consent
90 min
Committee Reports
Board committees include: Outreach, Finance, Personnel, Local, Co-op Development, Hiring, Member Relations and Expansion. Currently, these reports also include two task forces: legal structure review, and bylaws review. 
share
40 min

                                                               Total Meeting Time:        3 hours 

Wednesday, March 13, 2013

Co-op Day of Support for St. Peter's Workers: Thursday at 5PM!

What: We invite Co-op members to join us in supporting local healthcare workers (who, ironically, have had their healthcare cut.)

When: Thursday, March 14th at 5PM

Where: Providence St. Peter's Hospital, 525 Lilly Rd. NE, Olympia, WA. 98506


“I have a child with disabilities and with Providence’s healthcare cuts, I will NOT be able to get my young child to the doctors and therapies she needs. How can Providence make my child fail in her growth to become the best person she can be with her disabilities, just to save a buck that they don’t even need?”
Sabrina Duncan, Health Unit Coordinator, Providence St. Peter Hospital

Healthcare Workers Lose Access to Healthcare

Members of SEIU 1199NW recently had their healthcare benefits cut - meaning that the people who help keep us healthy will find it harder to access the very services that they provide!

As the union says:

On January 1, 2013, Providence implemented a new healthcare system for its employees that eliminated the comprehensive PPO and replaced it with a risky, expensive high-deductible catastrophic plan. While the PPO was just one of four options under the old system, more than half of SEIU Healthcare 1199NW members at Providence St. Peter relied on that option to get quality, comprehensive, affordable care for their families.

Plan2013Deductibles (individual / family)Out of pocket maximums (individual / family)
PPOEliminated$250/$750$1,500/$4,500
HSABecomes the base plan$1,500/$3,000$3,000/$6,000
The median Providence St. Peter member of SEIU Healthcare 1199NW earns $31,000 a year, so the increased family deductible represents nearly 10 percent of income—a huge burden for a working family. Even if an employee qualified for Providence’s HSA contribution—and only about half did last year—the deductible increase is still a big bite out of a family budget.

Providence’s new plans provide just the legal minimum free preventative care and wellness tools required by federal law. But national studies show that of catastrophic plan participants, 26% report not filling a prescription and 25% report not getting a recommended test or treatment because of the cost.[1] These plans in effect deny preventative care because enrollees either don’t understand how the plan works or fear high costs should a serious condition be diagnosed.

Read more at SEIU's website.