In 2005, California obtained a federal Medicaid hospital financing waiver known as the Health Care Coverage Initiative (HCCI) to expand health coverage for low-income, uninsured people in 10 California counties. With the HCCI set to expire in 2010, researchers presented findings from an independent evaluation of the HCCI's implementation in participating counties.

The speakers were:

• Vernon K. Smith, Health Management Associates (HMA)
• Barbara Edwards, HMA
• Nadereh Pourat, UCLA Center for Health Policy Research
• Gerald Kominski, UCLA Center for Health Policy Research

Highlights of the presentation were:

• Counties need more time to continue the work they have started, and researchers need more data to evaluate the projects and the HCCI.
• Expanding the HCCI to allow more counties to participate is a reasonable next phase.
• One of the recommendations by the researchers was to simplify administrative requirements.
• The state will likely not have spent all of the first two years of allocations ($180 million each year) because of slow-startup issues. Los Angeles County had ambitious enrollment projections that have fallen short. Some funding from Los Angeles is being reallocated to other counties that have exceeded their enrollment projections and funding allocations.
• All of the presenters were enthusiastic about county system redesign.

The presentation slides from Health Management Associates and the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research are available as Document Downloads.