Questions are growing over just how politicized the board of Orange County\u2019s healthcare plan for the poor is amid a face-off between a state assemblyman and county supervisors on if they should get to continue exerting control over the public health plan.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It comes after Assemblyman Avelino Valencia (D-Anaheim) rewrote a bill this week to remove county supervisors from the board and take away the power to appoint the rest of the board members.<\/p>\n
[Read: Could OC Supervisors Lose Control of County\u2019s Health Plan for the Poor?<\/a>]<\/p>\n To read the full text of the bill, click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n But Supervisor Vicente Sarmiento and Supervisor Janet Nguyen, who both currently sit on CalOptima\u2019s board, told a different story during an emergency meeting on Thursday afternoon when board members denounced the bill.\u00a0<\/p>\n Sarmiento claimed the entire bill was retaliation for the county legislative office not returning a call to Valencia.<\/p>\n \u201cYou don\u2019t want to dismember a board just because somebody doesn\u2019t return your phone call,\u201d Sarmiento said in an interview after the meeting. \u201cWe\u2019ll leave it with that.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n According to Sarmiento, the phone call was to clarify whether supervisors supported letting the alternate member for CalOptima\u2019s board read confidential legal documents after a dispute last year when Nguyen, who at the time was the alternate, complained she could not review the results of an investigation.\u00a0<\/p>\n [Read: Does OC\u2019s Healthplan for the Poor Really Know What It\u2019s Spending On?<\/a>]<\/p>\n While CalOptima\u2019s board previously voted against allowing alternates to review the documents, Nguyen voted in favor.\u00a0<\/p>\n In a statement to Voice of OC on Thursday afternoon, Valencia defended his actions, saying it was in response to the board\u2019s division on the issue and highlighting other political actions in recent years.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cOur office received a bill the County agreed to support unanimously. When AB 2194 came with divided support by each of the respective Supervisors that serve on the CalOptima board, we asked for clarification, which is what any office would do when unanimous support changes,\u201d Valencia wrote. \u201cThat\u2019s not a personal dispute, it\u2019s due diligence.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cTo move forward with the proposed CalOptima amendments, our office had asked that a majority of the Board reach consensus on whether they want to proceed,\u201d Valencia continued.\u00a0<\/p>\n Former Assemblyman Tom Daly, CalOptima\u2019s lobbyist and Valencia\u2019s former boss, backed that up in his comments to the board during public comment on Thursday afternoon.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cHe feels like there\u2019s too much politics in the operation,\u201d Daly said. \u201cI heard that from his lips.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Valencia\u2019s bill comes after multiple investigations into former Supervisor Andrew Do, who eventually pleaded guilty to bribery<\/a> charges after serving on CalOptima\u2019s board, and investigations into Nguyen when she served on the board over a decade ago.\u00a0<\/p>\n [Read: OC Grand Jury Issues Scathing Report on CalOptima<\/a>]<\/p>\n Do was not charged with anything in connection with CalOptima, but resigned from the board after he was fined $12,000 for trying to steer public contracts to campaign donors.\u00a0<\/p>\n [Read: Orange County Supervisor Andrew Do Faces $12,000 State Fine Over \u2018Pay to Play\u2019 Politics<\/a>] \u00a0<\/p>\n Nguyen also faced questions at the time from her fellow supervisors and former CalOptima board members<\/a> about her control of the agency.\u00a0<\/p>\n