Concerns about education and health care dominated a town hall meeting Saturday where four local Republican lawmakers looked forward to the 2016 legislative session that begins Wednesday.

Janice Taylor, a retired employee of the U.S. Department of State, said her top concern is health care and how the Affordable Care Act has impacted her. She said before the meeting began that her doctor left a practice that accepted insurance and started a concierge practice where patients pay a monthly retainer for care rather than paying on a per-visit basis.

“It’s really changing the way we seek medical care,” Taylor said.

She wanted to hear Saturday what local lawmakers were going to do to address what she said is a disaster in health care.

At the beginning of the meeting, most of the people in the crowd identified themselves as precinct leaders going into Colorado’s March 1 caucus meetings.

And state Rep. Janak Joshi acknowledged that both state elections and the presidential race would play a role in Colorado politics this year.

“Former state Rep. Larry Liston is here and he is running for House District 16 with me, so we’ll see,” Joshi said.

“Definitely, we are going to have a big budget fight,” Joshi said to the small crowd gathered in a common area of Colorado Christian Schools, a K-12 private school at 4855 Mallow Road.

Sen. Kent Lambert, vice chair of the state’s Joint Budget Committee, told the crowd his top priority is to “pass the budget balanced and on time.”

“That sounds fairly straightforward, but do you know how many states can’t do that?” Lambert said. “We’ve never not done that.”

He said Democrats have been working to manufacture a crisis in the budget that really doesn’t exist to “create a political narrative.”

Lambert told constituents that there is a way to prevent cuts to education funding (known as increasing the negative factor) and still balance the budget without adopting the governor’s plan to not give tax refunds called for by the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights. He said the money is there; it just needs to be spent properly.

Sen. Owen Hill, chair of the Senate Education Committee, said he will bring a bill next session that requires students be able to pass the U.S. citizenship test to pass civics standards requirements.

“This is the same test that every single legal U.S. immigrant has to pass,” Hill said. “This is the same test that Ted Cruz … that his family would have had to pass when they immigrated. This is a basic requirement.”

Those attending the meeting had a slew of questions about the frequency of testing, the ability to fund charter schools and other school-choice options, and how the state can retain good teachers and promote alternatives to college like vocational programs.

Rep. Gordon Klingenschmitt, who is running for a state Senate seat this year, said he will bring a bill that repeals the state’s implementation of the Affordable Care Act or “Obamacare.”

“It’s worth another try,” Klingenschmitt said.

All four lawmakers encouraged their constituents to reach out to them and to visit in Denver under the gold dome as they work to make budgets and laws during the 2016 session.

Contact Megan Schrader

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Twitter: @CapitolSchrader