LA citizens can begin enrolling for health insurance starting Oct. 1 (Charlie Magovern/Neon Tommy)

Live reggae, rhythm and blues, and hip hop music filled the air as farmers markets sold produce, kids got temporary tattoos and people from the South L.A. community danced the afternoon away. 

But this all came after the majority of people went through a large tent that said “Enroll in Obamacare Here.”

Earl Jones was the one of the people who happily came out from under that tent with an appointment to enroll in health insurance in just a few days. More importantly, he was leaving with the satisfaction of knowing he will soon have affordable health insurance.

“It was real simple and I didn’t have a long wait,” said Jones. “It’s always complex, but it’s a little bit easier knowing that every American can be qualified for health insurance. And that’s great.”

Earl Jones’s story is one that the vast conglomerations of health care advocacy organizations across Los Angeles County hope to repeat about 2.7 millions times as fast as they can, ideally by the end of this year.

Starting Tuesday, California residents can begin enrolling for new health insurance plans as a result of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), the monumental health reform bill signed by President Barack Obama in 2010.

Among the highlights of the legislation are guaranteed preventative care coverage, easier access to plans and protection from insurance companies charging more for a pre-existing conditions when enrolling. 

But what the organizations are most concerned about is the individual mandate, which requires that every American citizen be insured or face penalties starting Jan. 1. 

With roughly 27 percent of LA county currently uninsured--the highest rate of any county in the United States according to one health official--the goal of getting them coverage is one that is being addressed aggressively. 

According to Mayor Eric Garcetti, it’s even become competitive.

“I got a call from the White House, and they wanted me to challenge other mayors in the area,” he told the crowd at Powerfest.

The hardest part of this challenge might be that many of those 2.7 million people are either unaware of the new laws and services available to help them, or they just don’t think it will work.

Take Joe Green, for example. Sitting outside the In-Home Supportive Services building on S. Grand Avenue with his right arm in a cast, Green was doubted that Obamacare would be able to help him.

“It ain’t gonna make or break me,” he said. “I’m already broke.”

Officials like Eric Walsh, director of the Pasadena Public Health Department, want people like Green to believe otherwise, but realize it will require extraordinary effort on their part.

“We want to be advocates, which means we want to be intentional about how we approach all of these things,” he said at a public information session in Pasadena, Calif. Sept. 19. 

When the ACA act was passed, California was one of the leading states to implement changes to assist its residents in preparing them for the changes coming just under four years later. 

The biggest product of this movement is a new online marketplace run by Covered California, an organization devoted to providing easier access to more affordable health insurance. 

The marketplace, also known as the exchange, opens on Oct. 1 and will allow open enrollment for insurance plans that start at the beginning of next year, when all citizens are required by law to have health coverage.

Officials hope that the exchange will be able to simplify the shopping process, which was previously an immediate challenge and possibly a turn-off to potential buyers, particularly those on the fence about whether they could afford it.

“The website is a really good tool to get a sense quickly of what [the coming changes] are going to mean for you,” said Steven Abramson, marketing manager of the Community Health Alliance of Pasadena.

To enroll, applicants will supply Covered California’s website with basic information along with their household income and then be shown different plans (bronze, silver, gold, platinum) that all have varying levels of coverage and premiums.

For example, the bronze plan has the lowest premium, but the least comprehensive coverage plan while the platinum has higher payments but provides more assistance.

Despite the website streamlining the process, Mary Donnelly-Crocker, executive director of Young and Healthy, estimates that 80 percent of all applicants will need help during the enrollment process. 

She said this shouldn’t deter people, however, because Covered California has specially trained enrollment specialists available to provide assistance at any point in the process. Donnelly-Crocker envisioned the process of buying health insurance being similar to how everyone uses cell phones, despite not knowing how they actually work.

“Do you know how to make a call? Do you know how to send a text? That’s all that matters,” Donnelly-Crocker said. “And that’s what we want to say about Covered California. All you have to know is how to get help.”

Donnelly-Crocker also said that as many as 90 percent of people don’t know about the ACA, but there are forces of work to negate this issue, such as the Insure The Uninsured Project in Santa Monica.

Prior to Obamacare, ITUP’s work was aimed at helping get more uninsured Californians coverage by creating discussion about specific issues, such as the residually uninsured, among the leaders of the healthcare community.

But with the new legislation, ITUP has been able to receive more funding to get people out into communities, which according to Carolina Coleman, research manager of ITUP, is an ongoing project.

“This money hasn’t really existed before, so the groups haven’t really had the ability to go out and reach this many people,” she said. “It’s kind of a ‘guinea pig’ stage to see how the best ways are to handle the money.”

Coleman pointed out that language barriers are a crucial challenge, which has led them to try marketing campaigns with Telemundo and other non-english media to inform its target audience.

Read more about Obamacare here.

Reach Staff Reporter Charlie Magovern here.