North Jersey community groups ready to test HealthCare.gov
Sunday December 1, 2013, 11:02 PM
BY STEFANIE DAZIO
STAFF WRITER
The Record
As federal officials touted HealthCare.gov’s latest fixes this weekend, two North Jersey community groups were crossing their fingers for an improvement over the paper applications they’ve been using for the last month.
That could happen today. Based on assurances from the White House, locals are hopeful that they’ll be able to ditch the paper for the website.
“This is really a wait and see,” said Mary Garner, chief executive of the Paterson Community Center, the only organization in Passaic County to receive funds to help residents apply for insurance. “What has to be done is not in our hands to be done. We can’t make an online system. If the whole federal government with all of its money and all of its power and all the pieces of the mosaic that have to be put together to make it work, if they can’t do it, a little tiny community health center doesn’t have the wherewithal.”
The website — HealthCare.gov — was supposed to let consumers shop easily for health insurance, required by the Affordable Care Act when it was launched Oct. 1. The continued technical problems of President Obama’s signature domestic initiative have been a political disaster for him and fellow Democrats.
Nov. 30 was not originally intended to be a key date for the online enrollment system, but it took on outsized political and public importance when administration officials announced five weeks ago that the “vast majority of users” would be able to sign up for insurance through the site by that day. Government and outside technical employees have worked around the clock for weeks on the fixes so the administration could keep its promise to have the site working smoothly for most people by then.
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