OLYMPIA — Advocates for health care reform urged U.S. Rep. Brian Baird during a town hall meeting Monday evening to push for a national plan that includes a “public” insurance option like Medicare.

Several of the nearly 1,000 people who packed into The Washington Center for the Performing Arts also urged Baird, D-Vancouver, to back a single-payer system.

A few critics raised questions about the lack of medical malpractice reforms in Congress’ ongoing reform proposals, and one man said he thinks the reforms are unconstitutional.

“I have not made up my mind where I stand on this bill, in part because the bill is in process,’’ Baird told the crowd in introductory remarks, referring to House Resolution 3200, the main House bill.

But he called it better than doing nothing and said he does support a public option. But he regards a single-payer system, which several speakers urged him to support, as politically unattainable.

The town hall was the third of five events Baird is holding in the 3rd Congressional District, which sprawls from Olympia to Vancouver and out to the Pacific Ocean. And it came just three weeks after he angered reform critics by comparing some protesters’ actions to lynch mobs and Nazi-era “brown shirt” tactics.

Baird took a more conciliatory approach in his evening event, and although a few critics got heated in their remarks, Baird urged the audience not to interrupt and to let speakers have their say — including David William Hedrick, who questioned the legality of the reforms.

Hedrick, who said he was a U.S. Marine from Camas, said members of Congress “have no right” to mandate coverage, and he challenged Baird to pull out his pocket copy of the U.S. Constitution, then read from Article 10, which Baird did.

“I presume you are saying Medicare is not constitutional,” Baird said. “Correct,” Hedrick replied.

Baird said there is much debate but many scholars believe Medicare and similar programs are within the scope of the Congress’ powers.

“You are not the only person who gets to interpret the Constitution, sir,’’ Baird added.

One man, retired dentist Fleet Ratliff, walked out of the event in disgust, saying: “This thing is rigged.’’

The event was moderated by Joe Sharp, chief executive for Capital Medical Center in west Olympia. He used a barrel with ticket numbers to identify people to ask questions.

The first person asking a question was Debby Pattin, the organizer from President Barack Obama’s local campaign last year. Pattin spoke as a cancer survivor concerned about what would happen under reforms if she lost her husband’s insurance, which paid for her $400,000 of care.

Baird told Pattin that HR 3200 would prevent insurers from refusing coverage to people who have pre-existing conditions.

A Tumwater optometrist, Sandy Berry, said he had concerns that a small business with two or three workers cannot find a policy. Baird told Berry and other small-business owners the bill would help.

Others in the town hall crowd said before the event that they worry about Congress’ resolve to act.

“The Democrats need to be much more assertive,” said John Delapp as he waited to enter the theater.

Delapp and his wife, Janet Delapp, run a small ergonomics-consulting business that would see its health care plan costs rise to $55,000 a year if all seven employees used it, according to Janet, who favors a system that doesn’t make insurance dependent on a job.

Baird’s two Republican challengers in 2010, Jon Russell of Washougal and David Castillo of Olympia, both oppose Congress’ proposals, particularly HR 3200.

Heading This Way

    Democrat Brian Baird, representative in Congress for Washington’s 3rd Congressional District, will host a town hall meeting in Centralia Wednesday night.

    The event will start at 7 p.m. at Centralia College’s Corbet Theater. It is scheduled to last two hours.