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Labor and Personnel Health insurance reform remains on municipal agenda
Municipal officials will be able to implement several significant municipal relief provisions contained in the fiscal 2010 state budget, including local-option tax measures and closure of the telecommunications tax loophole on poles and wires.
But local leaders continue to wait for municipal health insurance reform, a top priority for cash-strapped cities and towns.
For several years, local leaders have been calling for relief from restrictive state laws that make it exceedingly difficult for cities and towns to implement changes in order to lower health insurance costs. While the Legislature is to be commended for rejecting a deeply flawed Senate budget provision that would have made health insurance changes subject to binding arbitration, the need for reform legislation remains.
“The binding arbitration plan was a non-starter,” said MMA Executive Director Geoff Beckwith, “and the entire approach in that budget rider was totally unworkable and would have been a large step backward for cities, towns, and local taxpayers. We are very pleased that the budget conference committee omitted it from the final fiscal 2010 budget.
“The challenge now is to win positive reform to grant real relief to localities.”
The goal of municipal health insurance reform is to provide municipalities with the authority to adjust their employee health insurance plans in order to hold down costs, as the state does on a routine basis.
Despite record local aid cuts, layoffs and service reductions – and with fiscal 2011 looking to be at least as difficult and damaging as this year – cities and towns are still required to collectively bargain and receive union approval before implementing changes to municipal health insurance plans in areas such as copays, deductibles and tiered networks.
The state has exempted itself from such bargaining obligations and routinely makes decisions to impose higher copays and make other health benefit changes for state employees, thereby lowering health insurance costs.
This issue will continue to be in the forefront of the municipal agenda for the foreseeable future. The MMA will continue to press its reform proposal, which would make health insurance plan design changes subject to impact bargaining. Such a reform would allow cities and towns to quickly address the need for plan design changes, would maintain collective bargaining for premium contribution rates (again, something that the state is not required to do), and would require impact bargaining over the effects of changes to health insurance plan design.
Having municipal employees pay a little more for office visits, medical specialists, pharmaceuticals, hospital stays, emergency room visits, and out-patient surgeries would allow cities and towns to lower premiums, reduce the burden on local taxpayers, and save municipal and school jobs.
Labor and Personnel Health insurance reform remains on municipal agenda
Health insurance reform remains on municipal agenda
Municipal officials will be able to implement several significant municipal relief provisions contained in the fiscal 2010 state budget, including local-option tax measures and closure of the telecommunications tax loophole on poles and wires.
But local leaders continue to wait for municipal health insurance reform, a top priority for cash-strapped cities and towns.
For several years, local leaders have been calling for relief from restrictive state laws that make it exceedingly difficult for cities and towns to implement changes in order to lower health insurance costs. While the Legislature is to be commended for rejecting a deeply flawed Senate budget provision that would have made health insurance changes subject to binding arbitration, the need for reform legislation remains.
“The binding arbitration plan was a non-starter,” said MMA Executive Director Geoff Beckwith, “and the entire approach in that budget rider was totally unworkable and would have been a large step backward for cities, towns, and local taxpayers. We are very pleased that the budget conference committee omitted it from the final fiscal 2010 budget.
“The challenge now is to win positive reform to grant real relief to localities.”
The goal of municipal health insurance reform is to provide municipalities with the authority to adjust their employee health insurance plans in order to hold down costs, as the state does on a routine basis.
Despite record local aid cuts, layoffs and service reductions – and with fiscal 2011 looking to be at least as difficult and damaging as this year – cities and towns are still required to collectively bargain and receive union approval before implementing changes to municipal health insurance plans in areas such as copays, deductibles and tiered networks.
The state has exempted itself from such bargaining obligations and routinely makes decisions to impose higher copays and make other health benefit changes for state employees, thereby lowering health insurance costs.
This issue will continue to be in the forefront of the municipal agenda for the foreseeable future. The MMA will continue to press its reform proposal, which would make health insurance plan design changes subject to impact bargaining. Such a reform would allow cities and towns to quickly address the need for plan design changes, would maintain collective bargaining for premium contribution rates (again, something that the state is not required to do), and would require impact bargaining over the effects of changes to health insurance plan design.
Having municipal employees pay a little more for office visits, medical specialists, pharmaceuticals, hospital stays, emergency room visits, and out-patient surgeries would allow cities and towns to lower premiums, reduce the burden on local taxpayers, and save municipal and school jobs.
Written by MMA Legislative Director David Baier
