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A Monthly Publication of the A Monthly Publication of the East Texas Association of Health UnderwritersEast Texas Association of Health Underwriters

March 2011March 2011

Voting for

TAHU’s

2011-2012 Officers open March 21-31st

Don’t forget to cast your ballot!

(see page 7 for details

on the candidates and how to vote)

In This Issue

2-3 Presidents Message

4 “Cyberspace: It never

Forgets” By D’Ann Miller

5-6 “Legislative Update”

by Wendy Vanderwater

7-8 Economic Impact of

Health Reform (by NAHU)

9 Message from Rusty Rice,

TAHU Past President and

Nominations Chair

10 A special note from

Joe Phifer, ETAHU

Past President

11 Special Wish Golf

12-13 TAHU Annual Convention

14 Mark your Calendar

15 2010-11 ETAHU Board

Please join us on Friday, April 15th

For ETAHU’s Monthly Meeting featuring

Beverly Davis, ETAHU Immediate Past President!

She will be presenting a 1 hour CE titled:

CE course TBA

See pages 12-13 for details

and registration

ETAHU ReviewETAHU Review

President’s Message: Spring has sprung in east Texas. How lucky we are to live in such a gorgeous place

in the spring. The flowers are blooming, noses are running, baseball season has

begun and spring turkey season is right around the corner.

This month began with Day at the Capitol in Austin. ETAHU was well represented with me,

Jennifer Davault, Wendy Vanderwater, D’Ann Miller, Karen Robinson, Jeff Sherrod, Judith Robin-

son, Toni Melton and Joe Phifer in attendance.

I thought that this year’s event was the best I had ever attended. Congratulations to Wendy

Vanderwater, who served as the TAHU Legislative Activities Chair. Great Job!

We were divided up and each one of us saw about three different representatives or senators. I

personally met with a staff member for Chuck Hopson, along with Jennifer and Judith and we

had a great meeting with Congressman Leo Berman. He is very supportive of our industry in

general and specifically agreed to support the Connector bill. This bill is very important because

it gives the power of the exchange for Texas to the state...not the federal government. Misty

Baker testified to the House the importance of keeping state control with the exchange and it

passed! Yea Misty! Jeff and I also met with freshman representative David Simpson.

ETAHU Review: March 2011

Judith Robinson, ETAHU member and 1st time Day at the Capital attendee had this to say about her experience.

“I enjoyed my time in Austin so much. It made me realize that although each person can invidually make a difference just by letting our legislators know our feelings on issues, as an organization with many members, we can get so much more accomplished! It also made me grateful all over again that we have such excellent legislators representing East Texas. I came away feeling much more optimistic than when I arrived.

I was also very impressed with the professionalism, knowledge, and dedication of the TAHU members. The information provided by the panels was so informative! ”


President’s Message (continued):

Our 8th annual Health Education Awareness was held on February 23 at Hollytree Country Club. Carol Bailey, Rob Larson and Ouida Peterson were our fabulous speakers for the day, delivering 5 hours of CE. Many thanks to our wonderful sponsors, which included: Gold: HealthFirst TPA, Humana Specialty Benefits, Threlkeld & Company Insurance, Trustmark Group Benefits and United Healthcare. Silver: Block Visionm, MetLife and Hibbs Hallmark & Company. Table Spon-sors: Employment Screening Services and Guardian. Big KUDOS to Jennifer Davault, Cynthia Swanson, D’Ann Miller and Brenda Davis for planning and implementing a wonderful event! The 9th Annual Special Wish Golf Tournament will be held Monday, March 28 at Hollytree

Country Club. Please make note of the new venue. The board of Special Wish is hoping to raise

enough money to grant the wishes of 14 kids this year. If you are a golfer, please sign up and

play. If you’re not, there are plenty of other ways in which to help. Please plan on attending

and supporting this event that truly makes a difference in the lives of these “special” kids.

Remember the TAHU State Convention will be held May 4, 5 & 6 at Westin La Cantera in San Antonio. All members are welcome to attend.

March Membership Meeting

Luncheon Sponsor

Thank you to Rachel Horton & Linda Crocetti from

The Insurance Exchange for sponsoring our

March 18th meeting!


Cyberspace: It never forgets By: D’Ann Miller,

ETAHU Education Chair I recently attended the 17th Annual TAHU “Day at the Capitol” in Austin. First of all: WOW, WENDY – YOU DID A MARVELOUS JOB!!! Secondly, I would like to share some of the speaker’s comments and specific points (minus the politics) from Dr. James “Jim” Henson of the UT Texas Political Poll, Professor Darren Shaw also from UT in the Government Dept and Texas Democratic Representative, Mark Strama. Please ponder these thoughts when commenting on any social media website, such as facebook, twitter, MySpace, etc.

Don’t always show your hand. The people on your facebook either already support you OR they are Looking for Ammunition AGAINST YOU.

BEWARE of Public access of your thought process because your first reaction is probably NOT GOING TO BE THE SAME AS YOUR FINAL JUDGMENT. Your “thought process” will appear as if you contradict yourself and not be looked on fa-vorably.

Simply put – sometimes it is a choice: You can destroy yourself with TOO MUCH

INFORMATION or you can “Just Shut Up.” (Sorry Mom, they used that Prohibited word, not me).

REMEMBER you have No idea what your future holds BUT once your information is in cyber space – you Can’t Take it BACK!


Legislative Update – March 2010

By Wendy Vanderwater, ETAHU Legislative Chair

Never mind that economic woes and poor fiscal planning have set in motion a state budget shortfall of unprecedented proportions, presently nearing $27 billion with pending cuts certain to affect all families as we tighten our belts to get through the next lean times, our State also must begin to adjust to the beginning stages of the 2010 Fed-eral PPACA Legislation, in particular the State Exchange requirement, which must be fi-nalized by 2013 and sustainable by 2015, as currently written. To aide in the later, we have TAHU Executive Committee member, Misty Baker, 1st VP of TAHU and TAHU Lobby-ist, Lee Manross, at the Capitol on a daily basis touting our message of broker involve-ment with unity. Anytime you have the opportunity to educate a member of the Legisla-ture on what you do, I encourage you to do so. Often times, the negative perception of an insurance agent boils down a misunderstanding of the true roles of the Agent / Broker. Professionals serve the public, which is far from the facilitation of a sales transaction – the majority of our time is spent in areas of service and education and efficient stream-lining of a mammoth and cumbersome healthcare access system that has many unfore-seen pitfalls to the average user. That being said, the recent TAHU Day at the Capitol was wildly successful. Becky Parker did a great job as emcee, facilitating morning events and keeping the day exciting. Carolyn Goodwin was excellent during panel discussions. Laura Firestone fills in the gaps and makes us shine; we have so much to be thankful for with her support at the State level. The ETAHU group that attended DATC consisted of Karen Robinson, Jeff Sherrod, Toni Melton, Judith Robinson, Jennifer Davault, Kim Braly, Wendy Vanderwater and Joe Phifer, who recently announced his candidacy for TAHU Secretary – potentially making Joe the first local ETAHU President to preside over the TAHU State Board.


Legislative Update (continued)

Wendy Vanderwater, ETAHU Legislative Chair

One bill in particular the TAHU the legislative committee is closely watching is HB 636, filed by Representative Zerwas. This bill creates the health benefits exchange, The Texas Health Insur-ance Connector, as mandated by the PPACA legislation. This bill is written in a format that TAHU supports and much of our agenda on March 1st centered on communicating our support for this bill at the Capitol that afternoon – that was our clear and concise message. Recently filed is a likely Senate companion bill, SB 1510 filed by Senator West out of the Dallas area. This bill currently does not have the included producer language, subse-quently added to the Zerwas bill, which we prefer, but TAHU leadership is optimistic to accomplish this through our coalition partners (NAIFA-Texas the IIAT). In closing, I want to thank everyone for their support of my role at the TAHU Legislative Activities Chair, which fundamentally means you orchestrate the DATC event planning from start to finish. I was honored to chair this task and pleased with the overall completion of the event. The ETAHU membership was able to successfully canvass 13 elected Senators and House members from Texarkana south to Lufkin, and

The marble floors and hallowed halls

of the Texas State Capital building.

A single bronze star

8 feet in diameter marks

the center of the rotunda

Dear TAHU members -

It's time to elect our Association officers for the 2011-2012 term! Again this year TAHU is con-

ducting elections electronically. However, paper ballots will still be made available upon re-

quest.

In order to vote, you must log into the website and you can only vote once. The system will not

allow you to vote more than once.

Login instructions are as follows:

User Name - first and last name (no spaces or punctuation)

Password - tahu (unless you have created a different personal password)

If you have logged in before but cannot remember the password you set, please email

[email protected] and request that information. To request a paper ballot, please also email

[email protected].

The TAHU 2011-12 officer nominations are:

~ President - Joanna Antongiovanni, San Antonio (automatic)

~ President-Elect - Misty Baker, Austin

~ 1st Vice President - Kelly Fristoe, Wichita Falls

~ 2nd Vice President - Mark Bellman, Austin

~ Treasurer - Jacqueline St. Hilaire, Dallas

~ Secretary - Cheryl Clark, Lubbock; Joe Phifer, East Texas

Biographies and candidate information are available for your review as a link in the ballot intro-

duction paragraph or you can click here to review them now.

Voting officially begins today and will end on Thursday, March 31. You will not be able to vote

after this date. Once the voting period has ended, the results will be certified by the nomina-

tions and elections committee and an announcement will be made via email. Click here to

get to the voting ballot on the website.

Everybody VOTE because In our association, your vote counts!

Rusty Rice

TAHU Immediate Past President/Nominations Chair [email protected] Texas Association of Health Underwriters PO Box 381506, Duncanville, TX 75138-1506 Ph 972-780-0066; Fax 972-709-0611; www.tahu.org



It’s been some time since I’ve written an article for the ETAHU newsletter and I cer-

tainly appreciate the opportunity to reconnect to you all. The Texas Association of

Health Underwriters has been a big part of my life for the past 14 years. As my

home chapter, East Texas AHU has taken up a large part of my volunteer activities

during this time period.

I owe a lot to ETAHU. This chapter allowed a twenty something kid from Tennes-

see who didn’t know the difference between a copay and coinsurance to get in-

volved. I learned a tremendous amount by working with you all. From learning

how to be a consultative salesperson, to volunteering on a board with my peers, to

later serving that board as President, my experiences within ETAHU have been in-

valuable to my personal growth in our industry.

Now, I’m ready for another challenge and I need your help to get there. I’ve decided

to run for the office of Secretary of TAHU. We have a tremendous Association and

I’m excited about the possibility of representing you on the Executive Committee.

In thinking about this opportunity, I’ve set forward two long-term goals for my time

on the board:

1. Improved communication from the state board to the chapter level leading to in-

creased transparency

Increased focus on the role of the agent for our friends in the legislature – the role of

the agent is more important now than ever and we must continue to educate our

elected officials on the real value that we bring to the table

With that being said, I need your support to win this contested race. I’ve loved my

time spent here in East Texas and I want the chance to represent you on the state

board.

Please do not hesitate to contact me directly with any questions. You can reach me

at either 972.523.0762 (cell) or [email protected].

Your friend,

Joe

Association Involvement Joe has been a member of TAHU since 1997 and has volunteered in various roles throughout the Association. Locally, he

has held many positions within the East Texas Association including that of Membership Chair, Legislative Chair, Bylaws

Committee, President-Elect and President (2006-07). In 2004-05, he was named ETAHU’s “Outstanding Board Member”.

He has also been active on the state level serving on the TAHU Convention Committee, TAHUPAC Committee and

TAHU Legislative Council where he was Director of Legislative Operations (2006-07) and Director of Legislative Fund

Raising (2007-2008). Additionally, he has served regionally as the Region VI Media Chair (2007-08) and nationally as a

founding member of NAHU’s Young Agents Task Force (2006-2008). In 2007, Joe was honored with the TAHU

“Volunteer of the Year” Award. He is a contributor to both TAHUPAC and HUPAC.

mailto:[email protected]

March 18, 2011 11:30– Buffet Opens Noon: CE Presentation

Membership Meeting at Hollytree Country Club 1.00 hour CE by D’Ann Miller

“Transparency in Healthcare Clarity, Control & Confidence”

TAHU Provider# 32408 / Course# 23573

March 28, 2011 Special Wish Golf Tournament at Hollytree Country Club

April 15, 2011 11:30– Buffet Opens Noon: CE Presentation

Membership Meeting at Hollytree Country Club CE by Beverly Davis

Course TBA

May 4-6, 2011 “Traveling New Directions”

TAHU 23rd Annual Convention

At the Westin La Cantera Resort in San Antonito

June 17, 2011 11:30– Buffet Opens Noon: CE Presentation

Membership Meeting at Hollytree Country Club Installation of new ETAHU officers followed by a 2.00 hour CE by Mark Hoobgood

“Ethics the NAHU way”

TAHU Provider# 32408 / Course# 3101


East Texas Association

of Health Underwriters

2010 – 2011 Board

Kim Braly President /

Communications/Media Relations

Jennifer Davault President Elect / Newsletter

Beverly Norman Past President

Karen Robinson Secretary

[email protected] (903) 581-0077

[email protected](903) 581-9935



Debbie Martin Treasurer

Brenda Davis Awards

Gail Norris Hospitality

Wendy Vanderwater Legislation / HUPAC

[email protected] (903) 533-8585 X209



[email protected] (903)581-0077

Andy Schoppert Membership

Kathy Rainwater Public Service

D’Ann Miller Education

Trevor Pearson Retention





Angie Pascual Sponsorships

Cynthia Swanson Symposium / Historian

Sandy Bailey Trustee

Mark Hobgood Trustee






















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