The Houston Department of Health and Human Services along with Harris County agencies are coordinating efforts to enroll the uninsured in the Houston metro in Obamacare. Under the Enroll Gulf Coast banner, agencies are approaching the initiative much like a natural disaster.

“The number of uninsured people that we have here in Harris County, 1.1 million, yeah, that’s a public health emergency,” said Ben Hernandez, deputy assistant director for the Houston Department of Health and Human Services according to the Texas Tribune. “That’s why it’s easy for us to say, ‘Let’s treat it like we’d treat a hurricane.’”

The Enroll Gulf Coast initiative has set up an “incident command structure” to coordinate the activities of 13 organizations in Harris and 12 nearby counties. The agencies use maps showing the ZIP codes with the region’s highest number of uninsured residents and “access” points, like community centers and libraries, to connect people in those neighborhoods with services. They use the information to host canvassing and health insurance enrollment events in targeted neighborhoods. The groups also use technology to track and coordinate enrollment efforts.

The rollout of Obamacare has been a fraught with difficulties from day one. A botched federal website launch, coordinated political opposition and state political leaders’ refusing to expand Medicaid have contributed to low enrollment, not only in Texas, but nationwide. Additionally state legislatures recently passed regulations of “navigators,” which Democrats claim will make enrollment more difficult.

Of the 6.2 million uninsured Texans, 28 percent would qualify for tax credits to help them purchase private health plans on the federal marketplace, and 14 percent would qualify for Medicaid coverage, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

In addition, more than one million Texas adults — 17 percent of the state’s uninsured population — fall into a coverage gap, according to Kaiser, because the state declined to expand Medicaid to include adults below the federal poverty threshold.

So far, only 118,532 Texans have selected a health plan on the federal marketplace.

Harris County, health insurance, Obamacare