The Legislature finds and declares all of the following:
- (a) The County of Los Angeles faces very grave challenges in providing health care for its residents.
- (b) Almost one-half of the residents of Los Angeles County have no health insurance or rely on public programs, such as Medi-Cal for health coverage.
- (c) More than 1.6 million of the 10 million residents of Los Angeles County have no health insurance. More than two million residents of Los Angeles County depend on Medi-Cal or other public programs for their health insurance and many of these Los Angeles County residents rely on the county medical system to obtain needed health care.
- (d) Because of these severe demands, the county medical system faces recurrent crises and is unable to meet the needs of the residents of Los Angeles County.