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Town, schools moving toward split... |
The health insurance plans of the town employees and the school employees might be split in an effort to get a better rate for the Board of Education.
“When we first put the plans together, we had the same exact plan, but after our union negotiations, we have a different plan,” John Boulton, chairman of the Board of Education, said.
During Tuesday's meeting of the Board of Education, the concept of separating the two plans was discussed.
“We spent two years working with our unions to address a problem dogging us for years, and now our employees will be paying a bigger share of the premium, so we owe it to them to find the best plan,” Boulton said.
Should this move end up increasing the cost of insurance for the town employees, in the end, there will still be a savings to the taxpayer.
“There will be an overall savings to the taxpayer for us to be separate, since there will be more of a decrease than an increase,” Marj Montague, the school finance director, said.
The Board of Education expects to have bids on its individual plan before the Board of Finance votes on a final budget. The Board of Ed intends to stay with its current insurance broker.
Peter Hovell, chairman of the Board of Finance, said that splitting the two groups came from the town's dissatisfaction with the insurance broker it shares with the Board of Education.
“No one was thinking of splitting the two groups until the selectmen brought it up last October, and the Board of Education, having looked at the situation since, in light of its new contract with employees, they realized there were significant savings,” Hovell said on Wednesday in an interview with The Darien Times.
“The Board of Education brought it up, and I think it's a situation when you ask for something, you should be prepared because you might get it,” he said.
John Crary, administrative officer, said the town only found out about the idea at a meeting in Tuesday morning that included representatives from the town and Board of Education. He said it is good for the town as it frees it to look for a separate insurance broker from the Board of Education.
“We didn't realize the Board of Education was looking into this, but it is not a problem,” Crary said.
He said the move could be mutually beneficial as a result of the information he found out at the meeting, and in the end, the taxpayer is what matters.
“It is all the same town, and the same taxpayer, and what we've heard today sounds like a reasonable way to go,” Crary said.
First Selectman Evonne Klein agreed. “I see this as a positive, an opportunity to pursue and work with a different broker — it is an opportunity to meet our needs,” she said.
However, Klein said the timing of the information could have been improved.
“Given that our negotiations are quickly approaching, a heads up a little sooner would have been appropriate here,” she said.
She said that because the town had pursued using a separate insurance broker last year, they were already up to speed.
“Our staff did the necessary work in the fall, and I know they will be ready for negotiations, but we were very open last fall with our concerns, and prior to that, the chairmen of the Board of Education and the Board of Finance were apprised of our concerns in a timely fashion,” she said.
Klein said those boards were not surprised when presented with the idea of the town pursuing a different broker.
“One only expects that same kind of courtesy,” she said.
“I think the Board of Education has always said we were going to remain with our broker, and we didn't really have a handle on the impact of the numbers until late in the process,” he said.
Boulton said he could not inform the town until he discussed it with his board.
“These are important decisions, and I don't act unilaterally — I couldn't communicate with Town Hall until I had communicated to my board, which I didn't do until Feb. 13th,” he said.
As far as when the town found out about the Board of Education's intentions, Hovell echoed Boulton's reasoning that the decision had only just been made by the Board of Ed.
“The realization only came up in the last couple of weeks, and they just found out about the possible savings, they only went over the facts in the last couple of days and the decision was only made by his (Boulton's) board over the last three days,” Hovell said.
He said he has only two concerns regarding this new concept: “One that the employees get the benefits they deserve, and the other that the town is not financially hurt by this move — they are out to bid, so we will find out,” he said.
Klein said that despite the timing of the news, it was good for the town.
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