County facing high health insurance costs

SEBRING - Highlands County commissioners voted to move a large amount of general fund dollars, if needed, into the insurance fund to make sure it stays solvent.

With luck, however, they may be able to use some of their allocation under the America Rescue Plan Act to defray some of those costs and save the trouble of having to move almost $500,000, just from the general fund, to cover part of an almost $1 million shortfall.

Business Services Director Tanya Cannady said the county's self-funded employee benefit plan, comprising medical, dental and wellness components, has 907 participants, including spouses and dependents of employees. Claims have outweighed contributions to the tune of close to $1 million, Cannady said, and the fund is running into a deficit.

She recommended commissioners transfer $375,000 of surplus funds from the dental fund into the health fund, and then put another $500,000 into the health fund, gathered from the various cost centers that pay for the various employees on the plan.

Once that's done, Cannady said, the fund should be in the black, for now.

She said the county might be able to use America Rescue Plan Act funds to pay for medical costs related to COVID-19, if the county's consultant on ARPA funds thinks they can do it.

It's possible. Cannady said the county, in just six months from March 1 to Sept. 30 of this year, had $502,000 in COVID-related costs, and another $12,000 in COVID-19 vaccination costs.

County Administrator Randy Vosburg asked commissioners to include in their motion that the county should look at using the ARPA funds first, before any transfers.

Clerk of Courts Jerome Kaszubowski said his accounting staff has forecast the financial health of the fund.

"We're also hopeful, but we're not as optimistic as some, based on our forecast," Kaszubowski said.

Last year, the entire employee benefit fund was at $994,000, Kaszubowski said, and this year started at negative $467,000: A $1.4 million loss in one year. The health fund, he said, went from $582,000 on Sept. 30, 2020, to negative $912,000 for a $1.5 million loss, in just health claims.

The benefit fund balance, as of Oct. 31, Kaszubowski said, was negative $781,000. Health and dental claims for the first two weeks of November, he said, are $652,000, which would far outstrip the planned transfer.

"Hopefully they can get better in the next two weeks of November, but if they don't you can do the math," Kaszubowski said.

Commissioner Chris Campbell said he hoped that those expense numbers would start going down with the change in insurance companies this year. He added that many people may have been rushing to get in their doctor appointments in September, after the height of the pandemic and before the annual benefits turned over.

Cannady said she is monitoring those costs on a weekly basis now.

Commissioner Kevin Roberts asked if it's a "probability" that the county could get $500,000 or more covered by ARPA. Vosburg said he was "95% sure," based on recently-passed legislation on the use of those funds.

"We just want to have our consultant also concur with that opinion," Vosburg said.

One big caveat, he said, is that the money would have to come, in pieces or as a whole, from one or many of the projects they had listed in the spending plan, which included sewer extension to the Emergency Operations Center and other such infrastructure.

Commissioner Arlene Tuck asked if this would clear up the budget from Fiscal Year 2020-21. Cannady said it would. Tuck then asked if the county could be in the same position next fall - running a big health fund deficit - and Cannady said that's a possibility.

Commissioner Scott Kirouac asked how much of the vaccination costs were the actual vaccines. Vosburg said it may be vaccines, but also drugs used to treat COVID-19 symptoms.

Vosburg said he needed to have commissioners make a decision that day, so funds can be moved over before year's end, for auditing purposes.