April 19, 2010. The Lakeland Ledger.
LAKELAND | The Polk Ecumenical Action Council for Empowerment, or PEACE, won promises from a majority of Polk County commissioners – barely – for two more primary care clinics in the county on Monday.
At PEACE’s annual “Nehemiah Action” rally at Resurrection Catholic Church, commissioner Randy Wilkinson was the swing vote, switching his answer from “maybe” to “no” to “yes.”
About 1,000 people representing PEACE’s 19 congregations attended the meeting, which marked the organization’s 10th annual rally to demand action from public leaders.
PEACE is a multiracial, faith-based organization that devotes itself to identifying problems facing the community, proposes policy solutions and presses public officials to support them.
Health care for the uninsured and underinsured has been a priority of PEACE for seven years, and it helped push for sales tax revenues and for new primary health care clinics in Lakeland and Winter Haven, which are intended to make health care available to the uninsured.
PEACE has been pressing for three more clinics to be built but has run into resistance from private physicians in the county, who want to care for the uninsured through a county-run insurance fund.
At Monday’s rally, commissioners Bob English and Jean Reed agreed to support the new clinics. Commissioners Sam Johnson and Ed Smith said they would not commit to PEACE’s request.
That left Wilkinson on the spot, and at first he said, “Maybe,” but pressed for a yes or no answer said he had too many reservations to answer yes. Asked later to reconsider his answer, he said he would support the clinics, although he added that the new national health care plan signed into law by President Barack Obama might make them unnecessary.
After the meeting, Johnson and Smith said they might eventually support the clinics but need more data.
“Right now, I can’t say clinics are the solution,” Johnson said.
PEACE leaders are pushing a collaborative health care network similar to one in Orange County, and Rick Daigneault of the Primary Care Access Network of Orange County gave a presentation explaining the network, which services 191,000 patient visits per year and helped reduce emergency room use by 25 percent, he said.
Smith said he would like to look at the network.
“Some questions can’t be answered yes or no. I always evaluate a problem by looking at both sides,” he said.
On another issue, affordable rental housing, PEACE got support from four of the five commissioners for a plan to create a trust fund to help subsidize rents. PEACE’s proposal calls for a first draft of the plan to be ready by January.
Johnson said he could not give his support, explaining after the meeting that he wanted to see more details before agreeing.
In other business, PEACE commended efforts of a task force to create a residential drug treatment facility. The partnership includes the county commissioners, the Polk County Sheriff’s Office, Lakeland Regional Medical Center, Tri-County Human Services, Peace River Center and the Polk County Drug Court.
