The classes will take place each week from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m.
The cost is $55 for the entire six weeks.
If you or your friends have decided that you want to start yoga, this is the best class for beginners.
If you used to take yoga and have gotten out of the habit, this is a good class for re-entry.
Sign up at the first class.
Lakeport Yoga Center is located at 422 Lakeport Blvd., across from Bruno's.
Call 707-263-9400 for more information.
The group will meet at Grace Evangelical Free Church, Conference Room C-1, 6716 Live Oak Drive, Kelseyville.
The meeting will start at 6:30 pm.
There are no fees or weigh-ins. Everyone is welcome.
For more information contact Jennifer at 707-277-0626.
SAN FRANCISCO – Blue Shield of California (BSC) has withdrawn its rate filing with the California Department of Insurance and the company will not increase rates to any individual or family plan member for the remainder of the year, announced BSC chairman and CEO Bruce Bodaken on Wednesday.
The not-for-profit health plan has 340,000 individual and family plan members in California.
As a result of Wednesday's decision, Blue Shield individual policyholders will save $35 million to $40 million this year.
"Our not-for-profit mission is to provide Californians with access to quality health care at an affordable price," said Bodaken. "As long-time advocates for universal healthcare coverage, we are also deeply committed to the success of health reform. The best way to fulfill our mission and make reform work is to keep costs down. By agreeing not to raise rates this year, we are helping to make coverage more affordable for our members during tough economic times. It's a financial risk for us, but a risk that's worth taking."
"We have long acknowledged that the individual health insurance market is broken and we are pleased that the rules will change in 2014," added Bodaken. "But health reform will succeed only if we restrain the rising cost and utilization of medical services that is driving premium increases. We are dedicated to working collaboratively with providers and regulators to address that issue."
Blue Shield lost $27 million on individual health insurance coverage in 2010 and even with the now withdrawn rate increase, the company expected additional losses on this business in 2011.
In October 2010, the company filed for new individual market rates with the Department of Insurance, to be effective in March 2011.
In January, Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones asked Blue Shield to delay the filing for 60 days and the company complied. At the same time, Blue Shield submitted the rates to an independent actuarial review by David Axene, who had completed rate reviews for the Department of Insurance in 2010 and discovered errors in several filings.
Blue Shield also promised to pay refunds to its members if Axene's review found that the rates were too high. On March 1, Axene released his report, which concluded that the rates were appropriate. With Wednesday's action, however, that filing is withdrawn and the new rates will not take effect.
“I am pleased that Blue Shield announced this morning that it has decided not to move forward with the third of its three rate increases in less than a year,” said Jones.
He said for some Blue Shield policyholders, the total of these three rate increases was as much as 87 percent. The third rate increase itself was an average of 6.5 percent.
Jones said Blue Shield's decision confirms the need to give the insurance commissioner the authority to reject excessive rate hikes. “Many Californians will be surprised to learn that the Insurance Commissioner does not have the authority to reject excessive health insurance rate increases. In California, unlike in 20 other states, health insurers get to decide whether to increase health insurance rates without approval from the insurance regulator, just as Blue Shield raised rates two times and proposed to raise rates yet a third time, until today’s announcement.”
Jones is sponsoring Assembly Bill 52, authored by Assemblymember Mike Feuer, to give the Insurance Commissioner the authority to reject excessive rate hikes.
During his first week as insurance commissioner, Jones learned that Blue Shield had just notified their policyholders of a March 1st premium increase. For many policyholders that would have been their third health insurance premium increase since October 2010.
He said he immediately asked Blue Shield to delay their March 1 premium increase for 60days so that he would have the time necessary to thoroughly review their rate filing. Blue Shield initially refused his request for a 60-day delay.
“I also asked Anthem Blue Cross, Aetna and PacifiCare for 60-day delays in implementing their pending rate increases and they all agreed to the delay. Blue Shield then agreed to a 60-day delay,” he said.
Over time, the companies have provided Jones' department with much of the information requested about their proposed rate increases. It was just last week that the department received additional requested information necessary to do a thorough review of these rate increases.
The information provided by Blue Shield and other insurers about their rate filings is posted on the Department’s Web site at www.insurance.ca.gov/0250-insurers/HlthRateFilings/ .
SACRAMENTO – On Friday California Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones and Assembly man Mike Feuer held a media conference call to highlight the critical open-enrollment period for kids’ health insurance that began on Jan. 1 and ends next Tuesday, March 1.
Jones and Feuer were joined on the call by Novato resident, Julie Walters, the parent of a child with a pre-existing condition.
During the open enrollment period, parents can sign up their children for more affordable health insurance.
As a result of President Obama’s federal health care reform plan and AB 2244 by Feuer, children with pre-existing conditions cannot be denied coverage – they also cannot be charged rates that are more than double the rates of healthy kids.
Parents of healthy children without insurance should also sign their kids up during this period; kids who don’t sign up during open enrollment periods may be subject to a 20 percent surcharge on their insurance rates for a full year.
“One of the most important changes that federal health care reform has initiated is allowing for children with pre-existing conditions to attain health coverage,” Commissioner Jones said. “This initial open enrollment window is critical and there are only a few days left before it closes, so parents should take full advantage of it by signing their children up for coverage.”
“Under my new law, kids can receive the health care they need, even if they have a pre-existing condition,” Feuer said. “But it's crucial that parents act during this open enrollment period by signing up their children for health insurance. If they don't act by March 1, covering their kids could be much more expensive.”
Feuer authored legislation, AB 2244, that helps to implement this component of federal health care reform in California.
The new law, which has been in effect since January 1, gives California children access to affordable care and a healthy future by ensuring that certain children cannot be denied coverage or priced out of the market.
It also prohibits insurers that sell individual market policies in California from refusing to sell or renew coverage to children with pre-existing conditions – it also bans insurers from the individual market for five years if they do not sell policies to children.
“Parents need to take this opportunity seriously and enroll their kids immediately, because this is a unique chance to make sure children – especially children with pre-existing conditions – have health coverage at very affordable rates they may not be able to find later on,” Julie Walters said. “Even though my daughter does have health coverage, if anything should happen to that coverage through job loss or other circumstances, it is a tremendous relief to know that she cannot be denied coverage, even with her pre-existing condition.”
For more information, parents are encouraged to check the web site of the California Department of Insurance (CDI) at www.insurance.ca.gov, where they can find fact sheets on how to insure their children. Parents can also call CDI’s consumer hotline at 1-800-927-HELP or the state health insurance hotline at 1-888-466-2219 with any questions or concerns.
Another important resource is http://finder.healthcare.gov/ (or www.cuidadodesalud.gov for Spanish speakers), a Web site created to assist consumers in navigating their options under the Affordable Care Act.