Legislators avoid town meetings
By The ASSOCIATED PRESS with staff reports
SPRINGFIELD – Illinois congressional members familiar with the jeering and taunting that have peppered many colleagues' town hall meetings on health care reform say they've got no plans to host such forums, preferring to get feedback from constituents privately.
"I won't be doing sucker-punch town hall meetings," said Dick Durbin, the Senate's No. 2 Democrat. "They can do all the political theater they want, but I don't have to supply the stage for them."
Rep. Bill Foster, D-Batavia, has not held a town hall meeting on health-care reform. He has held one-on-one public meetings, though, which he calls Congress on Your Corner, during which constituents get three to four minutes each to talk with the congressman.
Dan McDonald, the deputy communication director for Foster, said that the congressman will send out an e-mail survey on health care in August and is planning a telephone town hall later in the month, the details of which have not been finalized. He said Foster did not have any traditional town halls planned so far, though.
“Rep. Foster has been listening to his constituents’ thoughts on health insurance reform in a variety of ways," McDonald said, "from holding 47 sessions of Congress on Your Corner, meetings at his office, and a health-care round table in July to speaking to the DeKalb County Farm Bureau, members of the Elgin Chamber of Commerce and constituents across the 14th District."
The bitter sessions convened by many federal lawmakers on recess underscored the challenge for President Barack Obama's administration as it tries to win over an increasingly skeptical public on the costly and far-reaching task of revamping the nation's health care system.
Desperate to stop a hardening opposition, the White House created a Web site to dispel what it says are smears, and House Democrats set up a health care "war room" in Majority Leader Steny Hoyer's office to help lawmakers handle questions.
On Tuesday, Durbin's spokeswoman Christina Angarola said the senator "has long preferred smaller settings that allow for in-depth conversations," and "the events we've held thus far fit that mold," drawing feedback from constituents, small business owners, doctors and others.
In southwestern Illinois, Rep. Jerry Costello, D-Belleville, and Rep. John Shimkus, R-Collinsville, have opted not to host town hall meetings about health care, preferring to hear from constituents by appointment or in small groups.
Both lawmakers opposed the health-care reform measures that have been voted out of the Democrat-led committees. Costello doesn't like the bills' complexities, while Shimkus objects to the absence of market-based solutions, including tax breaks, to soaring health-care costs.
Costello figures he's hosted hundreds of town hall meetings since he was first elected to Congress in 1988, but he stopped the practice several years ago when special interest group members began monopolizing the gatherings.
A Shimkus spokesman, Steve Tomaszewski, said the congressman was not against town halls but uses media interviews to weigh in on Obama's plans.
"Hopefully, his responses help explain his positions and reflect that of the majority of his constituents," Tomaszewski said.
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