Lawrence Higby is a walking mix of healthcare and politics.
His company, Lake Forest-based Apria Healthcare Group Inc., provides home healthcare services. Medicare, the politically sensitive federal program for seniors, covers many of his customers.
Higby, Apria’s chief executive, has felt the sting of funding cuts and successfully lobbied for a federal fee for Apria and others dispensing drugs under Medicare and Medicaid.
Besides running Apria, Higby is a key player in the New Majority, a Republican group that wants the party to focus on fiscal and business issues, rather than social issues.
He’s stepping down this month as chairman to make way for Paul Folino, chief executive of Emulex Corp., a Costa Mesa-based technology company.
The New Majority has helped put in place moderate Republican leaders, including Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and state party chair Duf Sundheim, Higby said.
“I don’t think there’s a single measurement that doesn’t suggest we’ve accomplished more than I ever thought,” he said.
New Majority now counts more than 150 OC members, up from 100 in late 2003 and 65 in 2000.
The group’s political action committee has raised about $8 million for Schwarzenegger, according to Higby.
The group also is recruiting in heavily Democratic Los Angeles.
“We now have more than 40 members in L.A.,” Higby said.
What was the New Majority’s crowning moment,Schwarzenegger’s 2003 recall election win,has weathered some criticism in the governor’s second full year in office.
More conservative critics charge Schwarz-enegger with backpedaling on tougher reform as unions and other opponents mount a campaign against the governor’s efforts.
“He’s suffering a barrage of television being spent against him,” Higby said. “And most of the television that’s being spent against him has little to do with the reforms he’s trying to promote.”
Higby, who served in the Nixon administration, still is unwavering in his support of Schwarzenegger.
“My belief is this fight is just beginning,” he said. “It’s not over. The reforms that he is going to champion have overwhelming voter support in all of the polling that’s been done.”
By month’s end, what’s left of the governor’s special election reform effort,a state spending cap, redistricting and expected support of a measure to limit union dues,should qualify for the November ballot, Higby said.
That way, Schwarzenegger “is going to have ballot measures he can sit down with the Legislature with and say, ‘Either we’re going to get these resolved or I’m going to move ahead (to the voters),'” he said. “The issue in the fall will not be Arnold Schwarzenegger. The issue will be those reforms.”
Cooper’s Revision
Lake Forest-based Cooper Cos. told Wall Street earlier this month its 2005 revenue wouldn’t meet earlier views. Profits still are on track.
The maker of contact lenses and women’s surgical devices now expects yearly sales to come at $840 million to $850 million, down from an earlier projection of $867 million to $879 million.
The downward revision stemmed from Cooper’s $1.2 billion buy of rival Ocular Sciences Inc. in January, Cooper said. Issues with integrating sales forces were cited.
Another factor: unsold spherical contact lenses from Ocular. It could take some six months before excess levels of spherical lenses return to normal, Cooper said.
Cooper did reaffirm its full-year net income projection of $135 million to $140 million, before onetime acquisition and restructuring charges.
Cooper’s shares had lost some ground prior to the announcement because of investor fears that the contact lens maker was losing ground to rivals.
In an analyst’s note issued after Cooper revised its forecast, Joanne Wuensch of Harris Nesbitt, a New York-based investment bank, said she believed that the action “relieves uncertainties surrounding the stock, provides clarity on the Ocular Sciences integration and associated business disruptions and addresses investor concerns over the impact of silicone hydrogel lenses to Cooper’s market share.”
Bits and Pieces:
Peregrine Pharmaceuticals Inc., Tustin, submitted an investigational new drug application to the Food and Drug Administration to start a first-phase clinical trial of its Tarvacin drug to treat patients with chronic hepatitis C viral infection. Peregrine said the trial would look at things such as safety and viral load in patients who have failed standard treatment for the liver disease. Clarient Inc., San Juan Capistrano, signed a deal last month with Translational Oncology Research International, Los Angeles, under which Clarient’s BioAnalytical Services business unit will perform biopharmaceutical research services for Translational-sponsored studies. Translational is devoted to evaluating what it calls “novel agents for cancer treatment.”
