The refusal of some companies to pay for women’s contraception has created a gaping hole in employee insurance coverage for women nationwide, said discrimination lawyer Roberta Riley, who spoke to almost 30 students, faculty members and senior citizens about non-legislative ways to achieve contraceptive coverage at 4:30 p.m. Monday in 180 PLC.
Invited by Students for Choice and Planned Parenthood and accompanied by two other guest speakers, Riley shared in providing a wealth of information to the audience, including a brief history of contraception and the future of employee insurance coverage.
Riley, 41, general counsel for Planned Parenthood of Western Washington, won a Ms. Magazine Woman of the Year Award for her accomplishments on behalf of women last November. She currently leads Planned Parenthood’s Fair Access to Contraception project, which aims to persuade every health plan in the nation to cover the prescription contraceptives women need to prevent unintended pregnancy.
“Roberta is a hero to me,” said fellow speaker and Planned Parenthood Public Affairs Director Kitty Piercy.
Senior anthropology major Kate Phillips is co-director of SFC, which organized the lecture and its preparatory workshop Monday and has been “off and on” since its establishment in 2000. Phillips said SFC works very closely with Piercy, the first person to suggest bringing Riley to campus.
“Here at the University, students have it easy when it comes to insurance and contraception,” she said. “The purpose of having these speakers is to get students thinking about what they will do when they need to get coverage after graduation.”
Phillips gave a short speech, which included summary of contraception through the years and how it’s progressed.
“Technology has not guaranteed access,” she said, while discussing more recent aspects of the issue before introducing the speakers for the evening.
Diane Rosenbaum, chairwoman of the Oregon Women’s Health and Wellness Alliance and the first speaker of the evening, discussed issues concerning Oregon’s more recent efforts to get contraception covered by employee insurance.
“Birth control is a big out-of-pocket expense to women in Oregon,” she said. “It is discriminatory not to offer it to all female employees.”
Riley, the second and main speaker of the evening, served as the lead counsel in Erickson v. Bartell Drug Co., the landmark discrimination case in which, on June 12, 2001, the federal court held that an employer’s exclusion of contraception from its health plan is illegal sex discrimination. After a video compilation of news coverage of the decision, she explained her experience with the case. Riley said it was a challenge from the beginning.
“When I first approached insurance companies with the case and a request to include contraception in employee coverage, they said, ‘You’re gonna have to make us,’” she said.
A former Oregon House Representative and a strong activist for the availability of contraception on an international level, Piercy, the third speaker of the evening, said Oregon residents can act toward the same goal in a number of ways, including voting for representatives who support the issue.
In addressing the young women of the audience, she said, “When you talk to your friends and ask, ‘What difference does it make who you vote for?’ I guess now you know the answer.”
In the last few minutes of her speech, Riley strongly encouraged Oregon residents to partake in the Letter Campaign, a movement in which individuals write letters to their employers demanding improved insurance plans. After a copy is sent to state lawmakers, the employer cannot say, “Our women aren’t asking for this,” when approached with a coverage case, she said.
“Someday, I hope our sons and daughters will live in a world where every child is wanted and loved and cherished,” she said.
Caron Alarab is a freelance reporter
for the Emerald.