Peoria County may soon drop its self-insured health plan for employees in favor of an insurance pool with other governmental entities.
Health insurance is a major driver of costs for the county. The self insured plan also has limitations, like only allowing employees to visit doctors within the Carle Health system in network, but not OSF HealthCare. Employees surveyed also said they want co-pays, and more benefits like vision and mental health coverage.
Shauna Musselman is the assistant county administrator. She's recommending the county joins an insurance pool, which would place county workers in the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Illinois network.
"There's a number of different reasons why. Obviously, cost. That was the least expensive model based upon the quotes that were provided, and it also gave us network choice," she said.
The Intergovernmental Personnel Benefits Cooperative is a collaboration of some 164 governmental entities that pool their resources to purchase and provide insurance for members. IPBC would cost the county somewhere between $7.4 and $7.6 million a year, versus $8 to $8.4 million to remain self-insured.
Shauna Musselman says currently, any savings can stay in the employee health fund. For example, the county kept $1.1 million it didn't spend in last year's budget. But in a fully-insured plan, the insurance company keeps any excess premiums paid.
"The pool is kind of the best of both worlds in that we pay the premium in, and then at the end of the year, after the audits are completed, they do a true up, and they pay us dividends. So we would get that back to go back into the employee health fund for future costs. The pool does not keep that money," she said.
Musselman said the pool works like a fully insured model, but because the pool is self-insured, the county will get the money back.
The county has partially paid employee monthly premiums for the past three year, in an effort to keep the insurance affordable for workers.
The county would need plans in place by fall for open enrollment, with a Jan. 1, 2025 implementation.
