The public needs to be aware that the recent tactics of James A. Dugan, negotiator for the CCAPE (the probation officer’s union), is an example of conducting collective bargaining negotiations in a public forum. Mr. Dugan has completed his negotiating efforts on behalf of the CCAPE which resulted in an arbitration ruling that required, among other things, newly hired members of the CCAPE unit pay a 20 percent premium contribution the first year they take health insurance and 10 percent the second year. Additionally, all members of the CCAPE unit will be required to contribute 25 percent of any annual increase over 5 percent.
To clear up some of the issues Mr. Dugan presented in his recent Letter to the Editor:
Mr. Dugan refers in his letter several times to “the carrier”, which we believe he means Benecon. To clarify, Benecon is our benefits consulting firm, whereas Highmark is the carrier. Mr. Dugan has requested that we spend additional taxpayer money to bring in a second benefits consulting firm when we already have a very competent firm that advises many county and municipal governments in Pennsylvania.
For the record, Benecon has advised us over the last 7 years that our claims and utilization by employees and their families is much higher than other counties which is backed up by recent claims data provided to us by Highmark. In fact, when comparing the 20 counties who are PCHIPC members, Clearfield County has the second highest per employee per month cost for medical and prescription claims. If other member counties in the PCHIPC co-op show much lower medical and prescription claim costs, then the problem isn’t caused by where we purchase the insurance, it is driven by provisions in current collective bargaining agreements and the actual claim costs.
He also alleges that the County has “refused to change carriers”, and “has done nothing for the last five years”. In fact, we have changed carriers during the last 5 years from The Erin Group to Highmark and we are open to change anytime we have a better proposal that will meet all contractual obligations with our bargaining units. The employees he represents should be able to confirm to Mr. Dugan that they had insurance cards from The Erin Group from 2006 to 2009 and now they have cards from Highmark.
The tax paying citizens of Clearfield County need to know the Clearfield County Commissioners have been working over the past several years to bring the cost of health care coverage for county employees under control. Being a member county in the Pennsylvania Counties Health Insurance Purchasing Cooperative (PCHIPC) since 2005 has helped stabilize annual premium increases. Factoring the annual premiums along with the returned surpluses from PCHIPC, the overall premium has increased, on average, less than 6 percent per year with the projected increase for 2012 at less than 4 percent. An even more important number for the taxpayers is the fact that membership in the PCHIPC co-op has resulted in $2.8 million dollars in claim fund surplus being returned to the County General Fund or used to offset future premium increases, which saves taxpayer dollars.
Now that the County has done all this work to bring costs and premium increases under some control, the next step has to be taken at the bargaining table. While private and public sector unions have given major concessions to lessen health insurance costs, the bargaining units for Clearfield County Government have seen very little change. Current collective bargaining agreements have no contributions towards premium costs, no deductibles and very low co-pay amounts. Such changes have been achieved through the arbitration process with the CCAPE unit Mr. Dugan represents and the county is currently in the arbitration process with the Teamsters that will hopefully gain similar changes.
In conclusion, the County Commissioners are interested in finding the most cost effective solutions that will be in the best interest of the county employees and the taxpayers.
Joan Robinson McMillen
John A. Sobel
Mark B. McCracken
Clearfield County Commissioners