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Memorandum
To: ACA Members, House of Delegates, Board of
Governors and Other Interested Parties
From: Garrett Cuneo
Re: ACA EVP Weekly Report
Date: December 1, 2003
This week’s report includes the following items:
- ACA RANKS HIGH AMONG WASHINGTON’S ELITE LOBBYING GROUPS
- DYNAMIC CHIROPRACTIC PUBLISHER TAKES UNPRECEDENTED ACTION ON LAWSUITS
- NCLAF MONTHLY CONTRIBUTORS CROSS 1000 MARK; NAMES PUBLISHED IN DYNAMIC CHIROPRACTIC
- DEADLINE FOR DELEGATE ELECTIONS APPROACHING
- CAN’T ACCESS THESE LINKS?
1. ACA RANKS HIGH AMONG WASHINGTON’S ELITE LOBBYING GROUPS
The Wednesday, November 26th issue of the Washington Times included an Op-Ed article by Michael Heaney, a research fellow in the Centennial Center of the American Political Science Association, on the most effective lobbying groups involved with the Medicare bill just passed by Congress. ACA was listed among Heaney’s “top 25 most effective grassroots lobbying organizations for health care.” In his article, Heaney explains that, “These organizations are highly successful in building connections between their members and Congress on a wide geographic basis."
The chart lists ACA as the 19th-ranked organization, with the American Medical Association and
AARP listed as 2 and 3, respectively. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is listed at #21, with the
American Physical Therapy Association listed as #24. The osteopaths are not listed at all, and, of course, there is no listing of any other chiropractic organization.
According to the article, the “rankings are based on anonymous interviews with 77 health care staff in the personal offices of members of Congress. Interviews were conducted by the author between April and July 2003."
The ranking of ACA ahead of the American Physical Therapy Association (APTA) and others is all the more significant when you consider the substantial edge in resources held by these groups. Take APTA as an example. According to the 2002 Association Yellow Book, the APTA has an annual budget of $25 million and 168 employees. The ACA has an annual budget of $6.5 million and 40 full-time employees. Can you imagine what we could accomplish with APTA’s budget?
Heaney also prepared an article on the Medicare bill that ran in the Sunday, November 30, edition of the Washington Post, in which he explains, “Chiropractors, who are usually at a disadvantage in political contests against physicians, won a rare victory with this legislation, which creates a new chiropractic demonstration project and increases reimbursement for chiropractic services.”
To see these and other examples of ACA’s media coverage on the Medicare issue, including the Washington Times chart of the top 25 most effective grassroots lobbying organizations for health care, please visit:
http://www.acatoday.com/government/medicare/aca_lobbying_efforts.shtml.
2. DYNAMIC CHIROPRACTIC PUBLISHER TAKES UNPRECEDENTED ACTION ON LAWSUITS
If you turn to page 2 of the November 30/December 1 issue of Dynamic Chiropractic expecting to find the “Report of My Findings” column by Don Peterson, you’ll be surprised to find instead an article by George McAndrews preceded by the following statement from Don Peterson:
Publisher's note: “This marks the first time someone outside our organization has written an article for my ‘Report of My Findings’ column. I feel the work attorney George McAndrews is once again doing for our profession is so important that readers need to hear about it directly from him.”
Donald Peterson
While this statement in itself is significant, the article written by Mr. McAndrews regarding the lawsuits is equally important, as it brings into perspective the errors of the judge in the Trigon suit and why our appeal should be successful. The article also introduces a five-page summary of the key portions of the appellate brief that factually traces to the Trigon case the continuation of the conspiracy against this profession that was first identified in the Wilk suit.
There are a total of nine pages in Dynamic Chiropractic regarding the lawsuits. Thanks to Don Peterson for recognizing the importance of these lawsuits.
To read Mr. McAndrews’ article, please visit: http://www.chiroweb.com/archives/21/25/07.html. For the rest of Dynamic Chiropractic’s coverage of the lawsuits in this edition of Dynamic Chiropractic, visit:
http://www.chiroweb.com/archives/21/25/11.html
3. NCLAF MONTHLY CONTRIBUTORS CROSS 1000 MARK; NAMES PUBLISHED IN DYNAMIC CHIROPRACTIC
With the recent success at the Masters Circle program, we now have 1066 doctors who are monthly contributors to the lawsuits against HHS and Trigon. Look to the November 30, December 1 issue of Dynamic Chiropractic. The National Chiropractic Legal Action Committee has taken out a two-page advertisement listing the names of the doctors, students and
CAs who were monthly contributors as of November 10th.
Other contributions of note these past two weeks include:
 | NBCE: $75,000, bringing total to $275,000
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| SACA Palmer College: $100, bringing total to $3,177.35
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| Breakthrough Coaching: $9,850, bringing total to $99,200
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| Allied Health of Wisconsin: $50, brings total to $33,375
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| The Masters Circle: $500 (via EZ Pay), bringing total to $11,000
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| Performance Health (Biofreeze): $100 (via EZ Pay), bringing total to $1,400
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| Missouri State Chiropractic Association--District 1: $100 (via EZ Pay), bringing total to $6,800
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| Missouri State Chiropractic Association: $100 (via EZ Pay), bringing total to $2,000
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| Ohio State Chiropractic Association $5500—brings total to $52,130.30
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| Uncle Paul’s Chiro Business Training $1000—brings total to $4.000 |
4. DEADLINE FOR DELEGATE ELECTIONS APPROACHING
Members seeking election as delegate or alternate delegate must signify their intent in writing via certified mail by December 15, 2003, to the Corporate Secretary of the American Chiropractic Association, 1701 Clarendon Blvd, Arlington VA 22209
Ballots will be sent January 15, 2004 to voting members of the states of Alabama, Arizona, California North, California South, Connecticut, District of Columbia, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois South, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, New York Metro, North Carolina, Ohio, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Texas East, Vermont, Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands, Washington, Wisconsin and Wyoming.
Term of office is two years. For more details on the delegate elections, qualifications and procedures, consult the ACA Bylaws, Article VIII, Section C.
Garrett Cuneo
Corporate Secretary
5. CAN'T ACCESS THESE LINKS?
Some of you have been unable to download my PDF links. To view these file types,
you need Adobe's Acrobat Reader. This is a free utility available at www.adobe.com. If you need further assistance
viewing anything referred to in this report, please e-mail me at gcuneo@amerchiro.org. |
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