Legal Council Blog for Health Justice

Graham-Cassidy

October 31, 2017

Excerpted from our comments submitted by policy director Carrie Chapman to the Senate Finance Committee Hearing on Graham-Cassidy Bill: If this proposal succeeds, the devastating financial impact on Illinois is clear…

Thank your local congressperson

October 18, 2017

Nine hardworking Congresspeople sent a letter demanding answers to charges of discrimination against people living with HIV and AIDS by insurance plans. The letter was signed by Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL),…

Special education expose

October 17, 2017

First in a series of investigative reporting from WBEZ reveals the Chicago Public Schools overhauled special education and relied on a “secret” set of guidelines “that resulted in limiting services…

Stay-put protections

August 22, 2017

Governor Rauner signs a bill drafted by Legal Council for Health Justice which clarifies and strengthens the ability of parents and guardians to pursue mediation where there are disagreements with the school about their child’s special education services. In addition to clarifying the process for children to continue to receive special education services during the entire mediation process (called “stay-put protections”), the bill also requires updating of the Notice of Procedural Safeguards for special education that parents must receive. This notice had not been updated since 2009!

Client focus: Frank

July 5, 2017

Frank suffered a traumatic brain injury as a child and has been a patient at one of our medical partner sites ever since. Unfortunately, when Frank was 18 years old, he was in a severe car accident, leaving him with more complex medical issues including severe paraplegia.

I <3 Medicaid

July 5, 2017

Have you ever written a love poem? Was it an ode to Medicaid?

Here’s a thoughtful and elegiac social media post from one of our wonderful legal advocates, Marina Kurakin:

I <3 Medicaid. I want to hug it and squeeze it for keeping me alive as a kid…

Chaos to order?

June 8, 2017

Yesterday Judge Lefkow ordered the State of Illinois to negotiate a plan with us to pay over $2 billion in overdue Medicaid bills. The State’s failure to pay as a result of a three-year budget impasse puts millions of adults and children — as well as the entire safety net health system — at risk. Read the entire press release here and the court order here.

Stay tuned

June 7, 2017

Good news! Judge Lefkow issued a court order late today in our high impact Medicaid litigation with Shriver Center and Goldberg Kohn. We will be issuing a joint statement with co-counsel…

Client Focus: Kiara

May 18, 2017

Kiara and her daughters Jada and Imani experienced a rough few months. A death in the family unexpectedly changed finances, and Kiara fell behind on rent. When her landlord filed…