Republicans’ major tax and domestic policy bill, HR1, set into motion massive cuts to Medicaid that could remove millions of people from the safety-net insurance coverage. The changes are estimated to slash federal Medicaid spending by nearly $150 billion over 10 years.
As state-directed payments are cut, hospitals and clinics will also have to contend with a rise in the uninsured population, which is expected to increase by 10 million under the legislation, and dramatically increase uncompensated care costs from 2025 to 2034. For organizations already operating on thin margins, this combination could prove unsustainable, potentially triggering a wave of service reductions and facility closures in communities that can least afford to lose access to healthcare.
Dr. Naderah Pourat will moderate a panel featuring perspectives from a variety of lenses.
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Featured Speakers:
Stephanie Cohen, Vice President, Government and Industry Relations, Cedars Sinai
Tim Murphy, Vice President and Treasurer of Finance, Sharp Healthcare
Mitesh Popat, MD, Chief Executive Officer, Venice Family Clinic (VFC)
Moderator:
Nadereh Pourat, PhD, MS, UCLA Fielding School of Public Health & UCLA Center for Health Policy Research
SPEAKER BIOS
Stephanie Cohen, Vice President, Government and Industry Relations, Cedars Sinai
Stephanie Cohen is Vice President of Government & Industry Relations at Cedars-Sinai, where she leads the health system’s efforts to shape healthcare policy and advance a broad range of health and public policy priorities at the local, state, and national levels. She began her career in public service as an intern for Holly J. Mitchell during her first term in the California Assembly and later served as Associate Vice President of Health Policy at Keck Medicine of USC, as well as in senior roles with California Assemblymember Richard Bloom and Los Angeles County Supervisor Sheila Kuehl.
With more than a decade of experience in health policy and government relations, Stephanie has championed legislation to expand access to care, increase funding for community health centers, and improve services for people experiencing homelessness, veterans, and LGBTQ+ communities. She played a key role in California’s early implementation of the Affordable Care Act, led efforts to expand reimbursement for street medicine programs, and guided creation of the Los Angeles County Veteran Suicide Review Team—one of the first of its kind in the nation.
In 2022, U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Secretary Denis McDonough appointed her to the VA’s Community Oversight and Engagement Board, where she serves as a federal appointee helping to oversee development of the West Los Angeles VA campus.
Born in Philadelphia and raised in Los Angeles, Stephanie holds a B.A. in political science from UCLA and is pursuing her J.D. at Southwestern Law School.
Tim Murphy, Vice President and Treasurer of Finance, Sharp Healthcare
B. Tim Murphy is Vice President and Treasurer for Finance at Sharp HealthCare (“Sharp”) in San Diego. Sharp is the largest non-profit acute provider organization serving the greater San Diego community with four acute care hospitals, four specialty hospitals, three affiliated medical groups and a health plan with combined total assets of >$9Bn and total system revenues of >$5Bn. Tim is responsible for Sharp’s cash and investment strategies, debt and capital formation, accounts payable, merchant services and payroll functions. Tim also sits on Sharp’s enterprise technology and retirement planning steering committees. Tim joined Sharp in the Spring of 2025, bringing 24-years of experience serving the financial, capital and treasury needs of hospitals and health systems, colleges and universities, academic medical centers, non-profits and state and local government municipal organizations across the U.S. Tim joined Sharp from U.S. Bank where he served as Senior Vice President Healthcare Corporate Banking. Prior to joining U.S. Bank, Tim served as Managing Director and National Healthcare Industry Executive at J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. Tim is a Masters in Health Administration (“MHA”) candidate at UCLA’s Fielding School of Public Health where he presently serves as the VP of Finance for UCLA MHA Student Association. Tim holds a Certificate in Leadership from the University of Virginia Darden School of Business. He secured his undergraduate degree in Business Administration from the University of Lynchburg in Lynchburg, VA. Tim's passions include family time, executive and spiritual coaching, camping and fitness. Tim is engaged to Shannon K. Croughan, and has two beautiful children (son 15, daughter 13).
Panelist: Mitesh Popat, MD, Chief Executive Officer, Venice Family Clinic (VFC)
Dr. Mitesh Popat became chief executive officer of Venice Family Clinic on December 12, 2022. He came to LA from Marin Community Clinics in Marin County, CA, where he was CEO for five years. Dr. Popat has been a practicing physician and senior leader at community health centers throughout his career. Before leading Marin Community Clinics as CEO, he served as its chief medical officer. Prior to his tenure at Marin Community Clinics, Dr. Popat served as associate medical director of La Clínica de la Raza in Vallejo, CA.
With a passion for how technology can help break down barriers to care and reach people in novel ways, Dr. Popat has served as an advisor to several health tech companies in the San Francisco Bay Area. He also has been a commissioner with Partnership HealthPlan of California, a managed Medi-Cal plan that covers 550,000 people in 14 Northern California counties. Dr. Popat’s experience in community health extends globally and includes stints in India, Honduras and South Africa, where he worked with local medical professionals to improve preventive care using a group visit model, increase access to care, and describe the psychosocial factors surrounding HIV infection, respectively.
Dr. Popat holds a Doctor of Medicine and Master of Public Health from Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston, and a Bachelor of Arts in economics and Bachelor of Science in biological sciences from the University of California, Irvine. He served in the Stanford-O’Connor Family Medicine Residency Program in San Jose, and completed a two-year Health Care Leadership fellowship with the California Health Care Foundation and University of California, San Francisco.
Moderator: Nadereh Pourat, PhD, MS, Professor, UCLA Fielding School of Public Health & Associate Director, UCLA Center for Health Policy Research
Nadereh Pourat, PhD, is the associate center director and the director of the Health Economics and Evaluation Research Program at the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research. She is also a professor of health policy and management at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health, professor at the UCLA School of Dentistry and a member of UCLA/Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center, Division of Cancer Prevention and Control Research. Pourat is the vice chair for cost in the California Health Benefits Review Program (CHBRP).
Pourat focuses on assessing disparities in access to care of underserved populations, including the role of the health care delivery system in disparities and health care outcomes. Within this context, she has examined disparities in insurance coverage (e.g., Medicaid, private insurance) and health care utilization (e.g., preventive, primary, specialty, oral health, mental health, acute care) in multiple settings (e.g., safety net, private practice) and for multiple populations (e.g., immigrants and undocumented, Asian Americans, low-income adults, older adults). She has also examined the role of organization of the health care delivery system (e.g., dentist, physician, and health center supply and characteristics) and efforts to modify and improve the system (e.g., primary care redesign and patient-centered medical home, safety-net system integration) on access to care of general and underserved populations.
Pourat received her undergraduate degree in psychology from CSU Northridge and her master of science and doctorate in health services at UCLA Fielding School of Public Health.