În lumea mașinilor musculare V8 americane, bătălia pentru supremație este acerbă, iar fiecare concurent încearcă să-și demonstreze valoarea pe dragstrip. Recent, Ford Mustang Shelby GT500 din 2020 s-a confruntat cu Dodge Challenger Black Ghost din 2023 într-o cursă plină de rezistență, punând două vehicule puternice unul împotriva celuilalt.
Numit după infamul Dodge Challenger Black Ghost din 1970, Dodge Challenger Black Ghost din 2023 este departe de a fi un împingere. Cu un motor V8 impresionant de 807 cai putere, derivat din modelele Super Stock și Jailbreak, această ediție specială Challenger oferă un pumn puternic. Vor fi produse doar 300 de unități ale Black Ghost, ceea ce îl face un muscle car exclusivist și căutat.
Cu toate acestea, o provocare cu care se confruntă Black Ghost este greutatea redusă, înclinând cântarul la 4.476 de lire sterline (2.030 de kilograme). În lumea curselor de rezistență, greutatea poate fi o piedică semnificativă în calea performanței unui vehicul, atât la viteza în linie dreaptă, cât și la manevrabilitate prin curbe. În plus, anvelopele de vară montate din fabrică pe Black Ghost ar putea să nu fie ideale pentru maximizarea tracțiunii în timpul unei curse de tracțiune.
Pe de altă parte, Ford Mustang Shelby GT500 din 2020 se mândrește cu o platformă mai ușoară, înclinând cântarul la 4.168 de lire sterline (1.891 de kilograme), conform lui Edmunds. Deși nu este la fel de puternic ca Black Ghost, cu 760 de cai putere și 625 lire-picior (847 Nm) de cuplu, Shelby GT500 îl compensează cu o transmisie cu dublu ambreiaj mai rapidă și o caroserie mai ușoară.
Confruntarea s-a desfășurat pe parcursul a două curse, menite să testeze performanța vehiculelor sub diferite aspecte. Prima cursă a implicat o rezistență de un sfert de milă, urmată de o zonă de frânare, apoi o viraj în ac de păr și s-a încheiat cu o repeziciune înapoi la linia de start/sosire.
În cursa de un sfert de milă, Shelby GT500 și-a arătat puterea și accelerația, înregistrând 11,7 secunde impresionante, comparativ cu cele 12,6 secunde ale Black Ghost. Distanța dintre cele două vehicule a scăzut la 0,9 secunde pe parcursul unui sfert de milă, Shelby GT500 menținând un avantaj de viteză.
Virajul în ac de păr a dezvăluit impactul greutății lui Challenger, trăgând 1,14 G în comparație cu 1,35 G a lui Shelby GT500. În ciuda efortului curajos al lui Black Ghost, Shelby GT500 a trecut în cele din urmă linia de sosire cu un timp respectabil de 33,2 secunde la 143,3 mile pe oră (230,6 kilometri pe oră), asigurând victoria.
Pe măsură ce cursa de rezistență s-a încheiat, era clar că mașinile musculare V8 americane continuă să impresioneze, chiar dacă viitorul aduce reglementări în creștere privind combustibilul și emisiile. Familia de motoare HEMI de a treia generație, inclusiv puternicul V8 al lui Challenger, își ia rămas bun, făcând loc noilor tehnologii și grupurilor motopropulsoare electrice în modelele viitoare.
În timp ce viitorul poate oferi perspective interesante pentru mașinile musculare americane, fanii vor prețui, fără îndoială, moștenirea acestor animale V8 care au condus dragstrips-urile timp de decenii. Pe măsură ce ne luăm rămas bun de la motoarele HEMI de a treia generație, este o dovadă a impactului lor de durată asupra lumii performanței auto.
Înscrieți-vă pentru Newsletter-ul Motorious. Pentru cele mai recente știri, urmăriți-ne pe Facebook, Stare de nervozitateși Instagram.
Având în vedere că familia sa de drone kamikaze, anterior extrem de secretă, Phoenix Ghost, a apărut pe deplin în lumină, AEVEX Aerospace a discutat mai deschis capacitățile lor. Un detaliu deosebit de interesant a apărut acum: diferitele tipuri de fantome Phoenix pot fi configurate să lanseze atacuri direct în jos în timp ce trec deasupra capului, asemănător unui obuz de artilerie care explodează aerul, mai degrabă decât să fie nevoite să se apropie de țintele lor și să detoneze.
Capacitatea de atac de sus în jos a fost un punct culminant al unui videoclip promoțional Phoenix Ghost AEVEX lansat la începutul acestei luni, văzut mai jos. Imaginile au fost surprinse în timpul Northern Strike 24-2, un exercițiu de serviciu comun condus de Garda Națională din Michigan în vara trecută, care a inclus o varietate de componente aeriene, terestre și maritime, inclusiv microjet-uri JSX-2 mascați în rachete de croazieră și drone. AEVEX a oferit primele detalii oficiale despre familia Phoenix Ghost, dezvoltată inițial ca parte a unui efort în cadrul biroului de proiecte speciale Big Safari al Forțelor Aeriene și apoi s-a grăbit în Ucraina, în urma invaziei Rusiei în 2022, luna trecută. Informațiile despre drone, sau chiar despre cum arătau, fuseseră foarte bine păzite până atunci.
AEVEX a adus trei tipuri de drone Phoenix Ghost – Dagger, Dominator și Disruptor – la Northern Strike 24-2. Există dovezi că toate aceste trei tipuri sunt în serviciu în Ucraina. Se știe că există cel puțin un alt membru al familiei, Atlasul, dar nu este clar dacă forțele ucrainene i-au primit pe lângă celelalte tipuri.
„Pumnalul este de fapt unul dintre cele mai vechi modele ale noastre”, spune un membru al AEVEX în videoclip. „Așadar, 55 de lire sterline cu un focos puțin mai mic și mergând într-adevăr aproximativ 100-150 de kilometri [range-wise]. … o unitate mică îl poate opera și poate face diferența în spațiul de luptă în scenarii tactice specifice.”
Rămășițele unei drone kamikaze Dagger, un membru al familiei Phoenix Ghost, lansată de forțele ucrainene. prin X
Dominators sunt… într-adevăr sistemul nostru de camioane grele care este acolo”, continuă aceeași persoană. „[It has] Sarcină utilă în valoare de 100 de lire sterline [and] zboară peste cinci ore. [It] într-adevăr poate lua o mulțime de tot ceea ce doriți să transportați pe o distanță lungă sau să vă zăboviți într-o anumită zonă pentru o lungă perioadă de timp.”
Când vine vorba de Dominator, o fotografie, văzută mai jos și despre care se spune că a fost făcută chiar în Rusia, a apărut la începutul acestui an, care arată ceea ce pare a fi una dintre drone. Cu toate acestea, s-au ridicat întrebări cu privire la faptul dacă acesta ar putea fi un derivat de vreun fel produs local, având în vedere că guvernul SUA a impus, cel puțin public, restricții semnificative asupra forțelor ucrainene care foloseau muniții fabricate americane pentru a ataca ținte pe teritoriul Rusiei la acel moment. . Se știa că există anumite excepții și avertismente la acea vreme. Dronele se pot îndepărta departe de traseele de zbor planificate și din diverse motive. Autoritățile americane au relaxat mai recent restricțiile în cauză.
Epava unei drone de atac unidirecțional – care pare a fi Dominator, sau un derivat al acesteia – atacau Rusia la începutul acestui an. prin X
„Disruptor este într-adevăr un design simplu, cu multe capacități”, adaugă el. „Deci, este un design simplu din punct de vedere al producției. Este, de asemenea, un design simplu în ceea ce privește operațiunile. Deci, foarte ușor de adunat pe teren, dar totuși cu – acum vorbiți despre o sarcină utilă de 50 de lire sterline pentru a putea transporta asta din nou, cinci până la șase ore [in terms of endurance]. Deci, încă are destul de mult pumn.”
În ceea ce privește „pumnul”, videoclipul AEVEX arată toate cele trei modele care efectuează atacuri de sus în jos folosind focoase de fragmentare a exploziei care își aruncă țintele în schije mortale. Poze, văzute în postarea pe social media mai jos, cea apărută recent din rămășițele Disruptor lansate de forțele ucrainene arată că secțiunea focosului din acea dronă prezenta un „manșon” pre-notat, conceput să se spargă în fragmente după detonare.
Atacurile cu explozie de sus în jos oferă beneficii semnificative față de un design cu detonare punctuală, mai ales când vine vorba de angajarea personalului sau a țintelor neblindate în tranșee sau în alt mod în spatele acoperirii. Ele pot fi foarte eficiente împotriva diferitelor ținte în aer liber, inclusiv avioane și sisteme de apărare aeriană și vehicule cu piele moale și oferă mai mult un efect de zonă, în general.
Nu a fost evident inițial, dar videoclipul promoțional AEVEX anterior, văzut mai jos, conține vizualizări suplimentare ale profilului de atac de sus în jos al familiei Phoenix Ghost.
Nu se știe dacă alte tipuri de focoase, cum ar fi cele cu capacitate anti-blindură mai mare, sunt disponibile pentru familia Phoenix Ghost sau ar putea fi în dezvoltare, dar s-ar potrivi bine și cu modul de atac de sus în jos. Vârfurile tancurilor și ale altor vehicule blindate sunt de obicei acolo unde sunt cele mai vulnerabile. Spectrul tot mai mare al atacurilor de sus în jos, inclusiv cu drone și rachete ghidate antitanc special concepute, are deja impact asupra proiectării de noi capacități defensive pentru vehiculele blindate. La începutul acestui an, contractorul de apărare israelian Rafael a dezvăluit o nouă versiune a sistemului său de protecție activă (APS) Trophy, dovedit în luptă, cu funcții care ajută la înfrângerea amenințărilor de sus.
„Nu am intrat cu adevărat în anti-tanc sau anti-blindură, doar pentru că nu a fost o cerință pentru noi”, a spus Elizabeth Trammell, director senior de dezvoltare a afacerilor la AEVEX. TWZ la AUSA în octombrie. „O mare parte din aeronavele noastre, aveam capacitatea de bază și apoi clienții noștri au intrat și au spus: „Acesta este ceea ce ne dorim”.
Încă nu este clar cum dronele Phoenix Ghost știu unde și când să-și detoneze focoasele, dacă pot angaja ținte în mișcare sau dacă pot executa atacuri în alte moduri. „Munițiile rătăcitoare AEVEX detectează, identifică, localizează, raportează automat (DILR) și oferă efecte letale și neletale împotriva amenințărilor în mai multe scenarii și domenii cu o precizie și o viteză fără precedent” și sunt capabile să „navigheze, să ia decizii și să finalizeze misiuni fără precedent”. intervenție directă”, potrivit site-ului companiei.
După cum sa menționat deja, Pumnalele și Disruptorii au fost în mod clar angajați în conflictul aflat în desfășurare din Ucraina, iar Dominatorii par să fie și ei în uz. Cu detaliile care au apărut până acum, experții și observatorii știu acum ce să caute și, de asemenea, s-au întors și au identificat imagini ale multor drone necunoscute anterior ca membri ai familiei Phoenix Ghost.
1. Misterul rezolvat, cam. La începutul anului 2024, o serie de drone ciudate s-au prăbușit în Rusia: o epavă tipică este prezentată aici. Am petrecut mult timp încercând să aflu cine le-a făcut, dar recent publicitatea producătorului a anunțat această dronă
13. În acest moment, povestea s-ar termina în mod normal – cu excepția unui detaliu. Elicele dronelor prăbușite aveau scris de mână cuvântul „Front”. Exact aceeași scriere a apărut pe elicele unei alte drone. Acest lucru însemna că au fost aproape sigur fabricate de aceeași companie. pic.twitter.com/NU5Tvsyo7U
16. Această dronă este Pumnalul tot de la Aevex. Aceste drone se află în Ucraina cel puțin din ianuarie 2023 și au fost observate progrese semnificative în designul lor. Panoul de control al zborului a văzut mai multe iterații, așa că informațiile afișate aici sunt probabil depășite. pic.twitter.com/NCP2abSlSJ
AEVEX a mai spus că urmărește în mod activ noi oportunități de vânzări Phoenix Ghost, care ar putea veni împreună cu evoluții ulterioare pentru întreaga familie, dincolo de conflictul din Ucraina. Oricum, acum că dronele kamikaze au ieșit din umbră, pare să continue să apară mai multe informații despre capacitățile lor, inclusiv despre modurile lor de atac.
ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up to receive our biggest stories as soon as they’re published.
Reporting Highlights
Extensive Errors: Many states have sought to make insurers clean up their health plans’ provider directories over the past decade. But the errors are still widespread.
Paltry Penalties: Most state insurance agencies haven’t issued a fine for provider directory errors since 2019. When companies have been penalized, the fines have been small and sporadic.
Ghostbusters: Experts said that stricter regulations and stronger fines are needed to protect insurance customers from these errors, which are at the heart of so-called ghost networks.
These highlights were written by the reporters and editors who worked on this story.
To uncover the truth about a pernicious insurance industry practice, staffers with the New York state attorney general’s office decided to tell a series of lies.
So, over the course of 2022 and 2023, they dialed hundreds of mental health providers in the directories of more than a dozen insurance plans. Some staffers pretended to call on behalf of a depressed relative. Others posed as parents asking about their struggling teenager.
They wanted to know two key things about the supposedly in-network providers: Do you accept insurance? And are you accepting new patients?
The more the staffers called, the more they realized that the providers listed either no longer accepted insurance or had stopped seeing new patients. That is, if they heard back from the providers at all.
In a report published last December, the office described rampant evidence of these “ghost networks,” where health plans list providers who supposedly accept that insurance but who are not actually available to patients. The report found that 86% of the listed mental health providers who staffers had called were “unreachable, not in-network, or not accepting new patients.” Even though insurers are required to publish accurate directories, New York Attorney General Letitia James’ office didn’t find evidence that the state’s own insurance regulators had fined any insurers for their errors.
Shortly after taking office in 2021, Gov. Kathy Hochul vowed to combat provider directory misinformation, so there seemed to be a clear path to confronting ghost networks.
Yet nearly a year after the publication of James’ report, nothing has changed. Regulators can’t point to a single penalty levied for ghost networks. And while a spokesperson for New York state’s Department of Financial Services has said that “nation-leading consumer protections” are in the works, provider directories in the state are still rife with errors.
A similar pattern of errors and lax enforcement is happening in other states as well.
In Arizona, regulators called hundreds of mental health providers listed in the networks of the state’s most popular individual health plans. They couldn’t schedule visits with nearly 2 out of every 5 providers they called. None of those companies have been fined for their errors.
In Massachusetts, the state attorney general investigated alleged efforts by insurers to restrict their customers’ mental health benefits. The insurers agreed to audit their mental health provider listings but were largely allowed to police themselves. Insurance regulators have not fined the companies for their errors.
In California, regulators received hundreds of complaints about provider listings after one of the nation’s first ghost network regulations took effect in 2016. But under the new law, they have actually scaled back on fining insurers. Since 2016, just one plan was fined — a $7,500 penalty — for posting inaccurate listings for mental health providers.
ProPublica reached out to every state insurance commission to see what they have done to curb rampant directory errors. As part of the country’s complex patchwork of regulations, these agencies oversee plans that employers purchase from an insurer and that individuals buy on exchanges. (Federal agencies typically oversee plans that employers self-fund or that are funded by Medicare.)
Spokespeople for the state agencies told ProPublica that their “many actions” resulted in “significant accountability.” But ProPublica found that the actual actions taken so far do not match the regulators’ rhetoric.
“One of the primary reasons insurance commissions exist is to hold companies accountable for what they are advertising in their contracts,” said Dr. Robert Trestman, a leading American Psychiatric Association expert who has testified about ghost networks to the U.S. Senate Committee on Finance. “They’re not doing their job. If they were, we would not have an ongoing problem.”
Most states haven’t fined a single company for publishing directory errors since 2019. When they do, the penalties have been small and sporadic. In an average year, fewer than a dozen fines are issued by insurance regulators for directory errors, according to information obtained by ProPublica from almost every one of those agencies. All those fines together represent a fraction of 1% of the billions of dollars in profits made by the industry’s largest companies. Health insurance experts told ProPublica that the companies treat the fines as a “cost of doing business.”
They’re not doing their job. If they were, we would not have an ongoing problem.
—Dr. Robert Trestman, an American Psychiatric Association expert, speaking about insurance regulators
Insurers acknowledge that errors happen. Providers move. They retire. Their open appointments get booked by other patients. The industry’s top trade group, AHIP, has told lawmakers that companies contact providers to verify that their listings are accurate. The trade group also has stated that errors could be corrected faster if the providers did a better job updating their listings.
But providers have told us that’s bogus. Even when they formally drop out of a network, they’re not always removed from the insurer’s lists.
The harms from ghost networks are real. ProPublica reported on how Ravi Coutinho, a 36-year-old entrepreneur from Arizona, had struggled for months to access the mental health and addiction treatment that was covered by his health plan. After nearly two dozen calls to the insurer and multiple hospitalizations, he couldn’t find a therapist. Last spring, he died, likely due to complications from excessive drinking.
Health insurance experts said that, unless agencies can crack down and issue bigger fines, insurers will keep selling error-ridden plans.
“You can have all the strong laws on the books,” said David Lloyd, chief policy officer with the mental health advocacy group Inseparable. “But if they’re not being enforced, then it’s kind of all for nothing.”
The problem with ghost networks isn’t one of awareness. States, federal agencies, researchers and advocates have documented them time and again for years. But regulators have resisted penalizing insurers for not fixing them.
Two years ago, the Arizona Department of Insurance and Financial Institutions began to probe the directories used by five large insurers for plans that they sold on the individual market. Regulators wanted to find out if they could schedule an appointment with mental health providers listed as accepting new patients, so their staff called 580 providers in those companies’ directories.
Thirty-seven percent of the calls did not lead to an appointment getting scheduled.
Even though this secret-shopper survey found errors at a lower rate than what had been found in New York, health insurance experts who reviewed Arizona’s published findings said that the results were still concerning.
Ghost network regulations are intended to keep provider listings as close to error-free as possible. While the experts don’t expect any insurer to have a perfect directory, they said that double-digit error rates can be harmful to customers.
Arizona’s regulators seemed to agree. In a January 2023 report, they wrote that a patient could be clinging to the “last few threads of hope, which could erode if they receive no response from a provider (or cannot easily make an appointment).”
Secret-shopper surveys are considered one of the best ways to unmask errors. But states have limited funding, which restricts how often they can conduct that sort of investigation. Michigan, for its part, mostly searches for inaccuracies as part of an annual review of a health plan. Nevada investigates errors primarily if someone files a complaint. Christine Khaikin, a senior health policy attorney for the nonprofit advocacy group Legal Action Center, said fewer surveys means higher odds that errors go undetected.
Some regulators, upon learning that insurers may not be following the law, still take a hands-off approach with their enforcement. Oregon’s Department of Consumer and Business Services, for instance, conducts spot checks of provider networks to see if those listings are accurate. If they find errors, insurers are asked to fix the problem. The department hasn’t issued a fine for directory errors since 2019. A spokesperson said the agency doesn’t keep track of how frequently it finds network directory errors.
Dave Jones, a former insurance commissioner in California, said some commissioners fear that stricter enforcement could drive companies out of their states, leaving their constituents with fewer plans to choose from.
Even so, staffers at the Arizona Department of Insurance and Financial Institutions wrote in the report that there “needs to be accountability from insurers” for the errors in their directories. That never happened, and the agency concealed the identities of the companies in the report. A department spokesperson declined to provide the insurers’ names to ProPublica and did not answer questions about the report.
Since January 2023, Arizonans have submitted dozens of complaints to the department that were related to provider networks. The spokesperson would not say how many were found to be substantiated, but the department was able to get insurers to address some of the problems, documents obtained through an open records request show.
According to the department’s online database of enforcement actions, not a single one of those companies has been fined.
Credit:
Anson Chan, special to ProPublica
Sometimes, when state insurance regulators fail to act, attorneys general or federal regulators intervene in their stead. But even then, the extra enforcers haven’t addressed the underlying problem.
For years, the Massachusetts Division of Insurance didn’t fine any company for ghost networks, so the state attorney general’s office began to investigate whether insurers had deceived consumers by publishing inaccurate directories. Among the errors identified: One plan had providers listed as accepting new patients but no actual appointments were available for months; another listed a single provider more than 10 times at different offices.
In February 2020, Maura Healey, who was then the Massachusetts attorney general, announced settlements with some of the state’s largest health plans. No insurer admitted wrongdoing. The companies, which together collect billions in premiums each year, paid a total of $910,000. They promised to remove providers who left their networks within 30 days of learning about that decision. Healey declared that the settlements would lead to “unprecedented changes to help ensure patients don’t have to struggle to find behavioral health services.”
But experts who reviewed the settlements for ProPublica identified a critical shortcoming. While the insurers had promised to audit directories multiple times a year, the companies did not have to report those findings to the attorney general’s office. Spokespeople for Healey and the attorney general’s office declined to answer questions about the experts’ assessments of the settlements.
After the settlements were finalized, Healey became the governor of Massachusetts and has been responsible for overseeing the state’s insurance division since she took office in January 2023. Her administration’s regulators haven’t brought any fines over ghost networks.
The industry doesn’t take the regulatory penalties seriously because they’re so low.
—Mara Elliott, San Diego’s city attorney
Healey’s spokesperson declined to answer questions and referred ProPublica to responses from the state’s insurance division. A division spokesperson said the state has taken steps to strengthen its provider directory regulations and streamline how information about in-network providers gets collected. Starting next year, the spokesperson said that the division “will consider penalties” against any insurer whose “provider directory is found to be materially noncompliant.”
States that don’t have ghost network laws have seen federal regulators step in to monitor directory errors.
In late 2020, Congress passed the No Surprises Act, which aimed to cut down on the prevalence of surprise medical bills from providers outside of a patient’s insurance network. Since then, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which oversees the two large public health insurance programs, has reached out to every state to see which ones could handle enforcement of the federal ghost network regulations.
At least 15 states responded that they lacked the ability to enforce the new regulation. So CMS is now tasked with watching out for errors in directories used by millions of insurance customers in those states.
Julie Brookhart, a spokesperson for CMS, told ProPublica that the agency takes enforcement of the directory error regulations “very seriously.” She said CMS has received a “small number” of provider directory complaints, which the agency is in the process of investigating. If it finds a violation, Brookhart said regulators “will take appropriate enforcement action.”
But since the requirement went into effect in January 2022, CMS hasn’t fined any insurer for errors. Brookhart said that CMS intends to develop further guidelines with other federal agencies. Until that happens, Brookhart said that insurers are expected to make “good-faith” attempts to follow the federal provider directory rules.
Last year, five California lawmakers proposed a bill that sought to get rid of ghost networks around the state. If it passed, AB 236 would limit the number of errors allowed in a directory — creating a cap of 5% of all providers listed — and raise penalties for violations. California would become home to one of the nation’s toughest ghost network regulations.
The state had already passed one of America’s first such regulations in 2015, requiring insurers to post directories online and correct inaccuracies on a weekly basis.
Since the law went into effect in 2016, insurance customers have filed hundreds of complaints with the California Department of Managed Health Care, which oversees health plans for nearly 30 million enrollees statewide.
Lawyers also have uncovered extensive evidence of directory errors. When San Diego’s city attorney, Mara Elliott, sued several insurers over publishing inaccurate directories in 2021, she based the claims on directory error data collected by the companies themselves. Citing that data, the lawsuits noted that error rates for the insurers’ psychiatrist listings were between 26% and 83% in 2018 and 2019. The insurers denied the accusations and convinced a judge to dismiss the suits on technical grounds. A panel of California appeals court judges recently reversed those decisions; the cases are pending.
The companies have continued to send that data to the DMHC each year — but the state has not used it to examine ghost networks. California is among the states that typically waits for a complaint to be filed before it investigates errors.
“The industry doesn’t take the regulatory penalties seriously because they’re so low,” Elliott told ProPublica. “It’s probably worth it to take the risk and see if they get caught.”
California’s limited enforcement has resulted in limited fines. Over the past eight years, the DMHC has issued just $82,500 in fines for directory errors involving providers of any kind. That’s less than one-fifth of the fines issued in the two years before the regulation went into effect.
A spokesperson for the DMHC said its regulators continue “to hold health plans accountable” for violating ghost network regulations. Since 2018, the DMHC has discovered scores of problems with provider directories and pushed health plans to correct the errors. The spokesperson said that the department’s oversight has also helped some customers get reimbursed for out-of-network costs incurred due to directory errors.
“A lower fine total does not equate to a scaling back on enforcement,” the spokesperson said.
Dr. Joaquin Arambula, one of the state Assembly members who co-sponsored AB 236, disagreed. He told ProPublica that California’s current ghost network regulation is “not effectively being enforced.” After clearing the state Assembly this past winter, his bill, along with several others that address mental health issues, was suddenly tabled this summer. The roadblock came from a surprising source: the administration of the state’s Democratic governor.
Officials with the DMHC, whose director was appointed by Gov. Gavin Newsom, estimated that more than $15 million in extra funding would be needed to carry out the bill’s requirements over the next five years. State lawmakers accused officials of inflating the costs. The DMHC’s spokesperson said that the estimate was accurate and based on the department’s “real experience” overseeing health plans.
Arambula and his co-sponsors hope that their colleagues will reconsider the measure during next year’s session. Sitting before state lawmakers in Sacramento this year, a therapist named Sarah Soroken told the story of a patient who had called 50 mental health providers in her insurer’s directory. None of them could see her. Only after the patient attempted suicide did she get the care she’d sought.
“We would be negligent,” Soroken told the lawmakers, “if we didn’t do everything in our power to ensure patients get the health care they need.”
Paige Pfleger of WPLN/Nashville Public Radio contributed reporting.
