For Vic Fazio public service is a high calling. “It doesn’t really make much sense for people to disdain government,” he says. “If you are unhappy with it, get involved and try to change it, make it work better. That is what my philosophy has always been about.”

This is not an idle opinion—Fazio has spent his entire adult life “making things better” first in California’s government and then in the US House of Representatives.

Fazio’s retirement from Congress in 1998 did not mean abandoning his philosophy. He now pursues his calling as a lobbyist. Fazio and his team at Clark and Weinstock, a Washington, DC, management consulting firm that specializes in public policy issues, were hired earlier this year by the American Association for Homecare (AAHomecare) to convey the needs of home care to Congress and the public.

“One of the first things we want to do is address some of the problems the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 created for the industry, [such as] reducing reimbursement rates and dislocating a lot of elements of the industry economically,” Fazio says. “Our goal is to get the home care industry back into a position where it can profit and therefore expand its activities to be of assistance to even more people.”

AAHomecare hired Clark and Weinstock because of Fazio and his colleagues’ connections with senior congressional leaders, including Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert (R-Ill) and Senator Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn), and their staffs.

However, Congress is not the only audience for Fazio’s efforts. “Today, lobbying government is very often just a culmination in setting a tone, creating a mood that allows public officials elected or appointed to take action consistent with our goals,” he says. “You need to lay the groundwork and convey a message to the public. Then legislators and executives—people who are attentive to public opinion—will be more inclined to help [you] out.”

The team at Clark and Weinstock are not specialists in health care issues, Fazio says, but they are strong generalists who understand the value of home care for Americans. “Home care is an ideal way to provide assistance to people who might otherwise be cut off from their family and friends and be institutionalized,” Fazio says. “Home care is an extremely important element of the industry—one that can save health care insurers and individuals a good deal of money. I think it is a cost-effective and humane way to provide assistance to people and it needs to be maintained effectively.”

It is the message of home care’s importance that Fazio and his team must convey to the public and lawmakers before they can change the perception of the industry. “We have to open the eyes of some people who have perhaps a biased view of the industry that has led them to be particularly tough, some would say harsh, on the industry in the past,” he says. “I think one of the most fundamentally important things is to restore the trust of political leadership in the industry so they see it as an integral part of the continuum of care—one deserving of fair reimbursement.”

Fazio, who was chairman of the House Democratic Caucus from 1995 to 1999, says that it is his ability to work across party lines and find common ground in his interactions with Congress that make him effective in dealing with political leaders and the public.

“[Fazio] has a special ability to bring people together from different points of view and to work closely with each of the different elements within the Caucus,” said Cal Dooley (D-Calif) when Fazio retired. “He is loved by everyone in the House.”

The level of trust and credibility he established in 30 years of political leadership helps Fazio gain access to key legislators. He began his career in politics as the senior assistant to the Speaker of the California Assembly before serving in the California State Assembly from 1975 to 1978. After being elected to the US House in 1978, Fazio served on a number of high-profile committees including the House Appropriations, Armed Services, Budget, Ethics, and House Administration Committees.

In addition to his political service, Fazio cofounded the California Journal, which covers California state government and politics.

His partisan standing as a national Democratic leader would seem to hamper his effectiveness in working with an association made up of business owners—who tend to be conservative—and Republican leaders. This is not the case. “I got reelected 10 times to Congress—never defeated—in districts that could easily have elected a Republican,” he says. “So I have a way of getting along with Republicans and understanding small business.”

Fazio’s representation of AAHomecare also supersedes his political loyalties, though being a Democrat does play a role, even in his nonpartisan lobbying. “It is not as though [AAHomecare] hired a Democrat. I’m one person of a group that will be helpful,” he says. “Medicare and health care issues have historically been issues that Democrats have a great deal of interest in, not to say that Republicans haven’t. But certainly I think that your political background in the party sense is always relevant to some people in the process. Democrats now control the Senate, they have a close minority position in the House, so they are a factor on Capitol Hill. Republicans have lots of influence in the Administration, which just a year ago was the other way around. Where I will put my effort will be part of a total strategy that will involve every element of the political and public process in Washington. You need people of both parties to be in position to be of assistance.”

The lobbying team at Clark and Weinstock is bipartisan. Fazio’s opposite number in the Washington office is former Republican Representative Vin Weber—and partisan politics play no role in organization. “We have people of both parties who know issues, know the institutions, and can work together,” Fazio says. “We are not individuals as much as a team of people within the firm.”

With Fazio and the rest of the Clark and Weinstock team in home care’s corner, the industry may yet see movement on key issues despite the lack of consensus in the closely divided House and Senate this year.

C.A. Wolski is associate editor of Dealer/Provider.