While the official June 18 forecast for increased state revenue could smooth the path to a 
budget agreement in the Legislature, the deal is not yet done – and the continuing threat of a state-government shutdown should the impasse extend beyond June 30 worries plenty of folks.
One of them is Sean McCliment, clinic manager at Sea Mar Community Health Centers in Olympia. If the 2013-15 budget cycle begins July 1 without an agreement, “Individuals and families will lose access to coverage and our clinics will lose many of the resources we depend on to provide comprehensive services to our patients,” he wrote in a letter to the editor of The Olympian newspaper.
Sea Mar operates several clinics around the state that provide medical, dental, behavioral and social services, regardless of patients’ ability to pay, with help from the state budget. But it’s not just any agreement that’s critical to Sea Mar’s future.
“We urge the Legislature to remain committed to reasonable investments in health care that will maintain the community safety net and expand Medicaid,” McCliment wrote. “It is most certainly doable, and it is the right decision for the health of Washington and its people.”