“We literally have people who are dying because they don’t have access to health care,” McMahan said. Photo by Katja Ridderbusch, courtesy of NC Health News In signing their resolutions, they joined two towns in the region, Waynesville in Haywood County and Franklin in Macon County, which already signed resolutions supporting expansion, along with Reidsville in Rockingham County, and two other rural counties - Watauga and Franklin - that signed their own resolutions.īrian McMahan, the chairman of Jackson County’s Board of Commissioners, explained that he was in favor of Medicaid expansion before Cooper came to speak with the board, but he described the presentation as “thorough” and “compelling.” He said it strengthened his resolve.Ĭasey Cooper, CEO of the Cherokee Indian Hospital in Western North Carolina. Jackson and Swain, both rural counties in western North Carolina, aren’t exactly outliers. Cooper had already given the same presentation to Swain and Jackson counties’ Boards of Commissioners the month before, after which they unanimously passed resolutions supporting Medicaid expansion. He had good reason to believe Macon County commissioners might support it. “It’s my hope that at the conclusion of this presentation tonight that you will feel compelled to support a resolution to help close the coverage gap in North Carolina.”īy “close the coverage gap” Cooper was talking about expanding Medicaid to offer health insurance to the hundreds of thousands of North Carolinians who make too much money to qualify for Medicaid right now, but don’t earn enough to qualify for subsidies to buy an insurance plan on the Affordable Care Act marketplace.

“In the interest of efficiency, I will just jump right to the punchline,” he began. In addition to running the hospital, Cooper serves on a handful of different boards and has three kids - in other words, he’s busy. Cooper is the CEO of the Cherokee Indian Hospital. Nearly an hour into the August meeting of Macon County’s board of commissioners, Casey Cooper approached the podium.

By Clarissa Donnelly-DeRoven, North Carolina Health News

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