Letters advocate for Medicaid Expansion

Members of Holy Spirit's advocacy group have written and sent letters supporting Medicaid Expansion to the Joint Appropriations Committee on Health and Human Services. Here are the letters:


February 6, 2019

Rep. Eric Moore, House District 37
487 Signal Butte Rd.
Miles City, MT 59301-9205

Dear Rep. Moore:

Thank you for your service in our citizen legislature for the past decade and particularly as current chair of the Joint Health and Human Services Committee. We appreciate the difficult choices you must make. 

Holy Spirit Episcopal Church in Missoula, with approximately 850 members, is part of the Episcopal Diocese of Montana, as is Emmanuel Episcopal Church in Miles City. Under the guidance and leadership of our national church and state diocese, and as Christians, we take seriously Jesus’ example of caring for the marginalized: those who are poor, widowed, ill, and orphaned—people who lack power and influence.  "Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.' " Matthew 25:40

There is little question that Medicaid expansion in Montana through the HELP Act of 2015 has materially improved both the health outcomes of many of the 96,000 enrolled and the economic health of this state, bringing more than $600 million into this state. Continued access to expanded health care is critical to so many people across the state, like this family in Frenchtown:

Jeremy T.’s family of seven lives in a trailer park in Frenchtown. After a severe back injury and surgery this year, Jeremy is working at an unskilled job. His wife, mother of four little girls 12 and under, has multiple physical and mental ailments—diabetes, a large malignant tumor removed from her back a year ago, bipolar disorder and agoraphobia, meaning she has difficulty leaving her room. Four of the kids are quite healthy but the fifth, a 10-year-old girl, was born prematurely with a number of organs outside her body so her life has been a series of surgeries and medical procedures, medications and physical issues. While access to Medicaid has helped avert further medical crises, by the same token, loss of coverage under the HELP Act would be catastrophic to this family.

Stories like this, combined with the benefits of the HELP Act as outlined above, make a pretty good case for keeping Medicaid extension in Montana on the books and we hope you see it that way too. Please vote to continue Medicaid Expansion as is and ask your colleagues to do likewise.








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