After a summer and fall of packed town hall meetings, countless phone calls and e-mails, scores of conversations with constituents and numerous discussions with medical professionals, Congressman Tim Walz announced his decision Friday afternoon.

“I will be supporting this, barring any changes,” Walz said of the nearly 2,000-page health care reform bill set for a vote in the U.S. House as early as today.

That’s the opposite of what many at a Mankato town hall meeting in August wanted. A majority of people at the overflowing auditorium at East High School were skeptical of the health care reform, concerned that the bill would constitute a government takeover of health care and would explode the federal deficit.

Some shouted “No!” and booed each time the Democratic reform bill was mentioned.

Walz’s support will be applauded by others who told him reform is decades overdue, that it’s long past time when America should have ensured that all its residents have access to medical care, that the skyrocketing costs of health insurance must be brought under control, that employer-based health care coverage stifles entrepreneurial activity.

“This has been an incredible process of working with constituents, of working with health care providers, with all the concerned citizens of southern Minnesota ...,” Walz said.

In the end, Walz said the reform bill isn’t perfect, but it has the key elements needed to get his support and it’s better than the status quo.

Medical insurance is increasingly unaffordable for the middle class, he said. The skyrocketing costs are becoming too much of a burden on small businesses. And it’s the nation’s moral responsibility to make sure people with pre-existing conditions aren’t denied care, that people aren’t bankrupted by illness and that the uninsured are finally taken care of.

“We’re as close as we’ve been in 50 years to making health care affordable for Americans,” he said.

A Mankato Democrat, Walz said the bill accomplishes those goals while doing it in a fiscally responsible way.

“This is deficit neutral. It’s fair. It’s going to get a handle on health care costs.”

The bill contains several provisions Walz has insisted on for several months, including that it move Medicare toward a system that reimburses health care providers based on patient outcomes rather than office visits and procedures performed. That will reduce costs and make payments fairer for states — like Minnesota — that provide high-quality, low-cost health care, Walz said.

But Walz heard doubts about the bill right up to and including the media conference call where he announced his support.

Jerry Groebner, participating in the conference call as owner of the Lake Region Times in Madison Lake, questioned whether business owners like himself would be harmed by the legislation — which would penalize large employers if they don’t provide insurance to employees and pays for subsidized insurance partly through a surtax on wealthier Americans.

“It sure is not (deficit neutral) to the businesses,” said Groebner, who — along with his newspaper work — sells insurance and has served as chairman of the Blue Earth County Republican Party.

Walz said more than 98 percent of businesses would be exempt from the penalty for not providing employee health insurance. And the surtax only applies to individuals with incomes of more than $500,000 and couples with incomes of more than $1 million.

Even as he prepared to cast perhaps the biggest vote of his three years in Congress, Walz warned that the process is far from finished. The Senate is expected to take weeks longer to finalize its bill, and then the House and Senate bills will need to be melded.

“This is a long way from done,” he said.