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Will Lansing Join? by Dan Veaner While the Tompkins County Council of Governments is enthusiastic about savings to member municipalities that join the proposed Health Insurance Consortium, neither the Town nor the Village of Lansing share that enthusiasm.  For the Town it's a matter of timing versus insignificant savings.  For the Village the issue is minimal savings and added bureaucracy. Dave Sanders, Program Manager for Locey & Cahill, presented an update on the consortium  to Village of Lansing Trustees on April 20th.  Mayor Donald Hartill noted at that time that the rates seem reasonable, but noted that the hassle of attending consortium meetings wouldn't be worth the approximately $1,000 of savings.  Hartill reserved final judgment until the final numbers are presented. More than two years after planning began toward an inter-municipal employee health insurance consortium of Tompkins County municipalities, the Tompkins County Council of Governments (TCCOG) has thrown its formal support behind the effort and is encouraging municipalities to participate. With a municipal cooperative agreement now ready for municipal review, the Council, an association which includes all of the county’s 17 municipalities, today unanimously approved the resolution, which endorses the planning to date and encourages member municipalities to sign the inter-municipal agreement to participate in the consortium.  It recommends that each municipal board review the agreement and vote to join the consortium by August 1, 2009.  The opportunity to explore the consortium arrangement and to build a plan structure was supported through a more than quarter-million-dollar New York State Shared Municipal Services Incentive program grant, awarded in 2007.  The plan is scheduled to begin operation as of January 1, 2010.

	Last month the Town Board considered the proposal and concluded that Lansing couldn't participate because of timing.  If the Town agreed to participate and the Teamsters, who account for about half the Town's employees, said no when they negotiate three months later, councilpeople feared the Town would be on the hook for a fine for opting out later. "I think it may be better than the rates we can get in other places, or it may be a wash," said Councilman Bud Shattuck.  "It seems to me that it's a moot point.  For us to sign on to the consortium means that we have to have the union on board at the time we sign.  The signing has to be by July 1.  I don't believe that we'll be negotiating with our union until some time in September." "I don't see how we can join at this point," said Supervisor Scott Pinney.

By pooling resources, the inter-municipal consortium would create a cost-efficient shared employee health benefits program without diminishing benefits.  The municipalities, through the consortium, would build their own self-insured health insurance company administered by third-party administrators with oversight provided by a board of directors made up of municipal officials.  Cost savings would be achieved through elements including lower administrative fees; a larger insured pool would spread risk; and municipalities would have greater control of the rate of increase and the timing of budget decisions.

Project consultant Steve Locey, of the firm of Locey & Cahill, told the Council that preliminary analysis of 2010 premium equivalent rates indicates the consortium approach would reduce total premium costs for the municipalities by more than $1.2 million in its first year—a less than 4% increase overall, while rates in the traditional market are projected to increase by an average 9%.

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