CHARLESTON, W.Va. — State workers face benefit cuts in their health insurance plans in a number of options that will go before them in public hearings scheduled for next month. The options were approved Thursday by the Public Employees Agency Finance Board.
The program needs to come up approximately $55 million. The finance board is proposing at least $25 million come from active employees and $15 million from retirees. Premium increases are not part of the options.
The cost increase is being driven by prescription drugs, PEIA Director Ted Cheatham said.
“Pharmaceutical costs are trending double digit (increase). Medical trends are also in a six to seven percent range increase,” Cheatham said. “Costs are going up in the medical environment.”
The finance board is proposing a number of different options to reach the mark including changes in deductibles and benefit cuts.
“We are taking out a whole suite much like we took out last year,” Cheatham said. “We’re looking at deductibles, co-insurance, putting some fixed prices on some out of state procedures.”
None of the benefit cuts proposed last year actually went into effect after the legislature added funding to the program in the new state budget including a $43.5 million increase for employer premiums. State workers are paying a 12 percent premium increase in this year’s plan.
The legislature also approved a bill to add $15 million a year for five years to help reduce premium increases for retirees and to rebuild the agency’s reserve fund. The steps proposed in the new plans would be deeper without the new money, Cheatham said.
Public hearings on the proposals being Nov. 9 and will continue through Nov. 17.
Department of Administration Secretary Mary Jane Pickens said she knows state workers won’t be happy with the proposed changes.
“This does hit them hard and I think PEIA is doing everything it can to reign in these costs but the challenge is so great you just have to address it,” Pickens said.