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Monday, April 6, 1987 / University Daily Kansan
League seeks to aid medical indigents Native American films featured in area festival
Staff writer
AIDS, drug abuse and the increasing number of street people are problems that have brought social issues to the forefront of the nation's political agenda, the head of Kansas' social assistance agency said Saturday.
"There is a great deal of talk about welfare reform." Robert Harder, secretary of the state Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services, said.
"It is important to us as a nation that we establish some kind of minimum standard of living for people, no matter what their means of living," he said.
Harder spoke this weekend at the Kansas League of Women Voters convention at the Holiday Inn Holidome, 200 McDonald Drive. He said Kansas had fewer poor and homeless people compared to other states because of its strong financial commitment to social programs. But that could change, he said.
"The state has received $2 million in matching funds from the federal government for its medical assistance program, but the governor has used the money to maintain the status quo instead of raising expenditures for the program," he said. "More Kansans are without medical insurance everyday."
Harder was the secretary in former Gov. John Carlin's administration and agreed to stay in the position until Gov. Mike Hayden found a replacement.
The League of Women Voters is important in solving the mounting social problems confronting the state and the nation, Harder said.
"The way they research and study a problem and then develop solutions to them gains the respect of most lawmakers," he said. "It's hard to state and federal government to ignore them."
Ann Hebberger, president-elect of the league, said the state league would concentrate its efforts on developing solutions for the state's medical indigents.
"We've been trying to define what a medical indigent actually is but have discovered that it covers a variety of people who cannot afford medical insurance," she said. "Working women with children, people just off welfare who lose their benefits when they find a job and can't pay for health insurance on a minimum wage, and all the homeless and unemployed all fall under the category of medical indigents."
Hebberger said the Kansas league's efforts would tie into the league's national agenda of welfare reform and nuclear disarmament.
"The strength of our organization is at the
grassroots level," she said. "It keeps the national League of Women Voters in touch with the concerns of its members."
The rising cost of health care and the poor has sent the nation down the path of catastrophe, she said.
"It's good to bring the issues to people's attention," she said. But it's even better to have solutions. "We need to be solution oriented."
One hundred people from Kansas attended the weekend convention. The convention provided those attending an opportunity to exchange ideas, socialize and approve the league's longterm agenda.
"It gives everyone a chance to meet one another and perhaps come to a consensus on the important issues."
State Rep. Jessie Branson, D-Lawrence, attended the convention and said the league had a very positive influence on government policy-making.
"They are very effective lobbyists," she said. "They come well prepared and with the facts. No politician can ignore them."
By LAURA BOSTROM
Staff writer
During a discussion on Native American films yesterday, history professor Rita Napier recalled an Indian boy who said he wanted to be a cowboy instead of an Indian because in the movies the cowboys always won.
Napier spoke yesterday as part of Native America Now, a collection of films that illustrate contemporary life for Native Americans. The films are considered an alternative to Hollywood's portral of Indians.
Napier spoke about Hollywood's movies, which she said often pro-
moted also images about Native Americans using them as humorless or inferior.
Those images dehumanize Native Americans and make them unreal.
The festival, which began yesterday and ends Saturday, will be shown at various sites on campus and at Haskell Indian Junior College. The
festival is sponsored by the University of Kansas, Haskell Indian Junior College, KU's office of minority affairs, the KU Indian Club and the KU Graduate Anthropology Colloquium.
The program features a film by Lawrence film makers, including Jerry Schultz, Lawrence graduate student. The film is called "Another Wind Is Moving: The Off-Reservation Boarding Schools."
Schultz, who brought the festival to Lawrence, was the superintendent at the Kickapoo Indian School in northeastern Kansas.
The week-long festival covers Indian education, health and health care, and contemporary issues films, panels discussions and lectures.
The films were selected from the Museum of the American Indian's Native American Film and Video Festival, held in New York City since 1982, and will be shown at KU and Haskell Indian Junior College.
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