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General Membership Meeting

General Membership Meeting. Insurance October 14, 2013. Choosing PERS. Between January and September, there were 10 meetings with the Insurance Committee or a subset to discuss carriers. We have been in California Schools VEBA (VOLUNTARY EMPLOYEES BENEFITS ASSOCIATION) for about 10 years.

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General Membership Meeting

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  1. General Membership Meeting Insurance October 14, 2013

  2. Choosing PERS • Between January and September, there were 10 meetings with the Insurance Committee or a subset to discuss carriers. • We have been in California Schools VEBA (VOLUNTARY EMPLOYEES BENEFITS ASSOCIATION) for about 10 years. • Three carriers were interviewed. • California Valued Trust (CVT) • California Schools Voluntary Employees Benefits Association (VEBA) • California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPERS) • A decision was made to recommend PERS for our carrier.

  3. Reasons for choosing PERS included: • Variety of Plan Choices (11 instead of 3) • Variety of Doctor Networks (5 instead of 2) • Variety of prices which were generally lower • For example, there are 3 PPO options which are less expensive than the non-Kaiser HMO offered by VEBA. • United Healthcare HMO Family - $6,600 a year less for the same plan.

  4. Negotiations • Throughout the process, GEA was trying to negotiate better ways to cover insurance premiums. • Our main focus was to create an insurance pool which would allow for a single contribution per unit members to be spread evenly across the unit. • We also felt the contribution needed to be indexed so the contribution would not have to be renegotiated every year.

  5. Pool Plan Proposals • We proposed: • $11,000 per unit member contribution. Based on our VEBA placement, this would have allowed for $14,914 to be paid towards benefits. After moving in to PERS, this amount would likely be greater. • An indexing percentage equal to the percentage increase of actual money received by the District. • The District countered: • $9,500 contribution per unit member with new hires only getting $6,000 contributed for them. This would be $120,000 less than they contribute presently. • No index.

  6. Time Crunch • We have been trying to negotiate insurance since last December, but we went right up to the October 1 deadline to get out of VEBA and we still had no word on insurance payout from the District. • As we got closer to the deadline, we tried to have a bargaining session, but it was cancelled by the District.

  7. Current Proposals • On October 4th we proposed: • Increase the hard Cap to $10,000. • Keep the “family plan.” That is the plan where a family choosing the least expensive insurance plans will be fully covered. • Allow families and 2-parties that were in the “family plan” in 2013 to stay in Kaiser for 2014 and not incur a premium expense. We felt this would remain under the District’s budget for insurance. We also felt it was unfair to go this long to make a decision. Spouses already had to decide about their insurance options and it was difficult to make changes at this late date. • On October 9th we met again and the District summarily dismissed our proposal.

  8. What does this mean? • We are presently status quo. The District will contribute $9,500 towards a unit member’s insurance premiums. • In order for a family or 2-party to remain covered without a premium expense, they will need to change to Blue Shield Net Value HMO. This is the least expensive plan. • Families that decide to continue coverage through Kaiser will be subject to the same $9,500 cap as other unit members.

  9. What next? • If we want change, we need to change the School Board. The current Board still wants concessions even though the District will receive over $2,000,000 more dollars this year under the new funding formulas. • If the Board is changed, we can try again to negotiate fringe. Our candidates are sympathetic to the problem faced by our unit members in regards to fringe. • A new board would be seated in December and the first time increased insurance premiums will be taken from a warrant would be the end of February 2014.

  10. Right now we are status quo! • The District shall provide unit members with medical, dental, vision and basic life insurance ($20,000) benefits. Effective February 1, 2007, the District shall contribute a maximum of $9,500 per year towards these benefits. The unit member shall pay for costs in excess of benefit cap. • It has been the practice of the Garvey Education Association and the Garvey School District for unit members who need a family plan (more than 2 parties) to provide at least one plan without a premium expense to the unit member. • Unit members choosing the lowest family plan and lowest dental and vision plan will have their total cost for medical, dental, vision, and basic life insurance ($20,000) paid for by the District regardless of the $9,500 cap.

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