Records bill gets ax

Two years of legislative work by a Laguna Beach man became a casualty of the state budget crisis last week, when Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed 35% of all bills sent to him by the Legislature — including Senate Bill 1415.

SB 1415 was a bill about patient medical records — which Alan Boinus had spent nearly two years working on as a “citizen advocate.”

Boinus began working on the legislation after his wife, Rosalie, suffered from a second bout with breast cancer and learned that some of her original medical records were destroyed. The records would have been very valuable in determining further treatment.

“Most people would be shocked to learn, but it is perfectly legal for doctors to destroy patient medical records without informing them,” Boinus said.

Under SB 1415, doctors would have been required to inform patients about their medical records retention/destruction policy to give patients ample time to retrieve their records before they are destroyed.

The issue received widespread support, according to Boinus. The California Nurses Assn., California Congress of Seniors, California Public Interest Research Group (CalPIRG), and Breast Cancer Fund all indicated support for the bill, which also obtained bipartisan support in the Legislature, including that of Orange County Republicans, Assemblymen Chuck DeVore and Todd Spitzer and, State Sen. Tom Harman.

The measure was sponsored by Sen. Shiela Kuehl, a Santa Monica Democrat.

In vetoing more than one-third of the legislative work product, Schwarzenegger said that the unprecedented budget delay had caused him to approve only bills with the highest priority, a test which Boinus’ bill, along with many others, failed.

The veto message for SB 1415 and about 120 others he rejected states: “The historic delay in passing the 2008-2009 state budget has forced me to prioritize the bills sent to my desk at the end of the year’s legislative session. Given the delay, I am only signing bills that are the highest priority for California. This bill does not meet that standard, and I cannot sign it at this time.”

Boinus believes the bill may have been vetoed as “payback” to the legislature for failing to act on the budget.

“I don’t know how anyone who reads this veto message can figure out what the governor is thinking, especially when it comes to SB 1415,” Boinus said.

“How does the governor reconcile his comments that this bill wasn’t the highest priority when there is nothing in the law currently about protecting patient medical records until now? Are we now supposed to go back to the legislature and say the governor would support this legislation if only you prioritize it better. It leaves one slightly dumbfounded.”

Boinus accuses Schwarzenegger of showing “contempt” for taxpayers like himself by forcing them to revisit legislation that was costly to pursue in the first place.

He added the hardest part of getting legislation sponsored is finding an author.

That is because legislators are only allowed a limited number of bills to carry.

“Slots for legislation are usually reserved to professional lobbyists and political organizations, not regular citizens like myself,” Boinus said.

“The governor thinks that the machinery of Sacramento just moves on, but the governor was not thinking of citizens like myself when he vetoed this bill. I worked tirelessly as an unpaid advocate without the benefit of lobbyists or the taxpayers subsidizing my efforts. It was truly democracy in action.

“It is uncanny that after the governor vetoed SB 1415, one of his staffers actually apologized for the ‘confusion’ and told me that the veto message means that he is likely to support it ‘next time’.”

But there may not be a “next time” for the medical records retention bill, because Kuehl has been “termed out.”

“Without an author, there is no telling that this bill will ever see the light of day again,” Boinus said. “The governor has failed all of us who need to protect their medical records from being destroyed.”

CINDY FRAZIER is city editor of the Coastline Pilot. She can be contacted at (949) 494-2087 or cindy.frazier@latimes.com.