Central New York crowd fired up over health care - syracuse.com

Central New York crowd fired up over health care - syracuse.com

U.S. Rep. Dan Maffei had to rely on police to restore order as the two extremes in the national health care reform debate collided Monday night in a packed Syracuse school auditorium.



Minutes after Maffei's town hall meeting on health care began, a graduate student from Albany interrupted the congressman and shouted for Maffei to explain why he isn't supporting a bill that would establish a single-payer government health care system.

"I didn't come here to listen to you," another man in the crowd angrily yelled as Syracuse police escorted Peter LaVenia out of Lincoln Middle School.

For Maffei, the evening didn't get much easier.

Hecklers, opposed to expanding taxpayer-funded health programs, repeatedly drowned out a panel of New York health care experts whom Maffei asked to discuss how America should provide insurance to 47 million uninsured people and cut the cost of health care.

President Barack Obama is pressing Congress to create a public option to the private health care system that will not require anyone to give up employer-provided health insurance.

Maffei said he supports that concept. But the freshman congressman from DeWitt has not signed on as a sponsor to any bills. He said he is gathering input from constituents.

At one point, as some in the crowd tried to silence panelist Dr. Andrew Coates -- an advocate of replacing private insurance with a single-payer government system -- Maffei warned, "We will break up this meeting."

Renee Crandall, of Marcellus, and others in the crowd continued to razz and boo whenever a panelist voiced support for creating a taxpayer-funded public health care option.

"Is it so difficult to be polite?" Maffei said from the stage.

"We have a right to be heard," Crandall yelled from the front row.

After the 90-minute meeting ended, Maffei chatted with voters, taking grief from both extremes.

"Part of the challenge I have is these public forums bring out people on both sides, but don't bring out the people in the middle," Maffei said. "Half the room was vehemently for single-payer health care, which we won't get. And half was for no government involvement, which we won't get."

Doug West, of Skaneateles, didn't want to argue with Maffei. He just wanted to show him his $819 per month bill for individual health insurance. Six years ago, he said, he paid $350 per month for the same coverage.

"I don't know how anyone without huge amounts of money is going to survive," said West, a retired Welch Allyn Inc. engineer.