Alamance County Commissioners tweak finances

Jul. 18--GRAHAM -- The Alamance County Board of Commissioners approved two contracts on employee healthcare this -- one replacing an unsatisfactory insurance broker -- and moved up a replacement of the jail's failing air conditioner.

The first contract was a renewal of the county's contract with Alamance Regional Medical Center to expand the hours of the county's Employee Health Clinic from 25 to 40 a week using a position similar to physician assistant called a physician extender who can diagnose and write prescriptions under the remote supervision of a doctor. The contract will cost the county $303,822, but more employees visiting the clinic should save the county money, Finance Director Susan Evans said.

"Compare that to what we as a county would be paying if they were going to a primary care provider and average that out, you will see this contract is going to save us $100,000," Evans said.

Which is less than the $112,000 County Manager Bryan Hagood told the board in May the county had to spend to cover appointments at the clinic for about a third of the county workforce. The county's previous insurance broker, Pierce Group, failed to let the county know until March that employees who took the high-deductible insurance plan with the health savings account could get free visits to the clinic only for preventative services or jeopardize their HSAs. More than 330 employees took that option thinking they could use the clinic for any reason, Hagood said. The money can cover employees' costs for clinic visits they've already made and through the rest of the year when they can enroll in new plans.

On Monday, the commissioners approved a more expensive contract with a new insurance broker, USI Insurance Services, after county administrators reviewed applications from seven companies.

"We did not look at price until the end," Evans said.

The USI contract is $87,465, while the previous contract was about $30,000, Evans said.

"But you'll remember we has some issues," Evans said.

Jail chiller

The commissioners approved a change to the county's capital budget for the year, moving up a $116,666 project to replace the chiller at the jail, which has been a problem for years, though Hagood said he hopes it will make it to the end of the summer.

"If we take it down now, we'll have to bring in temporary cooling," Hagood said.

It will take six to eight weeks to get it delivered and 12 weeks to install it, so nothing will happen until the weather cools down anyway.

"I was over there the other day when it was 95 degrees, and they were coming outside to cool off," Commissioner Steve Carter said. "Not the prisoners."

"But they wanted to," Sheriff Terry Johnson said.

Reporter Isaac Groves can be reached at [email protected] or 336-506-3045. Follow him on Twitter at @tnigroves.

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