Starkville Mayor Parker Wiseman will soon veto four aldermen’s decision to choose the Integrity Group as the city’s insurance agent of record Tuesday because the deal costs $149,000 more than the lowest submitted bid and is expected to drive up monthly out-of-pocket rates for employees.
Four aldermen — Ward 1’s Ben Carver, Ward 2’s Lisa Wynn, Ward 6’s Roy A. Perkins and Ward 7’s Henry Vaughn — approved the deal after the board interviewed representatives of the Integrity Group, Regions Bank and two other applicants.
It is not known when Wiseman will issue the veto, but the entire process — including a potential board override attempt — could affect the timeline for open enrollment. Personnel Director Randy Boyd said the city must complete the exercise by mid-September before the Oct. 1 start of the fiscal year.
The mayor’s veto is expected to stand as it takes five aldermen to override the action.
Regions submitted the lowest-cost plan, a $1.7 million proposal, of the four applicants and received the highest service score (97 of 100) from a city staff review; aldermen, however, picked the Integrity Group’s plan, which received an 85, the lowest staff score, and cost $1.86 million, the most of the applicants.
The price gap between the two proposals, Wiseman warned, would pass on additional costs to employees if the Integrity Group’s services were retained over Regions.
Of the two plans, Regions’ proposal would save the city $164,000 from its previous insurer’s rate, while the Integrity Group’s option is only $15,000 cheaper than the preceding agent of record.
Comparing the two plans, the mayor said monthly rates for employees covering spouses through the Integrity Group will cost $21 more than Regions’ proposal. Those covering only their children would pay an additional $14 per month than the cost outlined in the Regions plan, he said, while the Integrity Group’s family plan is $150 higher than Regions’ proposal.
“(A veto) is relevant because we are already behind on the open enrollment clock. We moved it back so that we could get final pricing from these vendors. If I veto it and you have the board revote on this, somebody is going to have to move before we have insurance. On these terms, I can assure you it won’t be me,” Wiseman said. “If you have five votes, if you wish for our employees to pay more for their insurance coverage and if you wish for the taxpayers to pay more, then approve this motion. If you do not, I recommend you choose the firm that has clearly, on all the things we’ve asked them for, performed the best. Sometimes it is close; in this case, it’s not close.”
The Integrity Group became the apparent frontrunner to take over the role of Starkville’s insurer after Wynn made a February attempt to oust Tim Cox, the city’s long-serving agent of record, and replace him with the Starkville firm.
The board voted 4-2 to make the switch, but Wiseman canceled out the four aldermen with a veto.
Aldermen then voted to publically open the search to vendors by requesting proposals.
Wynn, who has backed the Integrity Group from the outset, initially motioned for the group to take over insurance responsibilities but temporarily withdrew her request after Perkins asked to table the issue for additional study time.
Wynn also agreed the board needed more time to study the issues before voting and said the four proposals were only recently placed in aldermen’s boxes for review.
“If we need more time or to call a special-call meeting, I’m fine with that,” Wynn said before motioning again for the Integrity Group. “My support will not change for whom I put on the table tonight. I do not wish for our city to be engaged with any banking institute in terms of health care. It’s the equivalent of going to the funeral home, and I will not support it.”
Wiseman then asked for a motion to approve Regions as the agent of record, which was defeated by the same bloc of alderman that would later name the Integrity Group. Wynn renewed her original motion, and it passed.
Ward 3 Alderman David Little, who supported Regions over the Integrity Group and has worked in insurance for 27 years, said he incorrectly assumed tasking staff to rate the proposals would “take the politics out of the process.”
“Now I don’t know why we did it just to pick someone like this,” he said at the table.
Both he and Ward 4 Alderman Jason Walker said the city missed an opportunity to parlay savings into salaries for first responders, two upcoming Fiscal Year 2015-2016 items Walker said “desperately need addressing.”
“I cannot comprehend the board’s selection of the Integrity Group when it will cost the city and the taxpayers roughly $150,000 more than Regions’ price. That is money that can be used in other areas, such as manpower shortages in police and fire, assisting with budgeting the upcoming pay raises as the board attempts to bring up hourly rates to at least $10 per hour or a myriad of other places where the savings could be utilized,” Little said Wednesday. “Personally, I believe there are issues with the board veering away from the agency that scored the highest on the RFP factors considered and choosing Integrity, who was scored the lowest and cost the most. That’s just bad business. It just looks bad all the way around, in my opinion, and I am sure to the constituents of those who supported this measure.”
Starkville’s insurance and Cox fell under scrutiny last year after aldermen unanimously approved a plus-one insurance extension that would have allowed employees to cover, among others, their same-sex partners.
City leaders were pressed to repeal the policy and Starkville’s statement of inclusion, the first non-discrimination policy from a Mississippi municipality that extended protections to lesbian, gay, bi-sexual and transgender employees.
Behind closed doors in January, aldermen repealed the statement of inclusion and amended the city’s plus-one insurance policy to apply only to employees in state-recognized marriages — at the time, heterosexual couples.
Wynn previously targeted costly insurance fees passed to workers as the reason driving the need to change insurance agents but later alleged in February Cox knowingly withheld “crucial information the board needed to make an informed decision” regarding the plus-one policy.
In preparation of delivering the proposed insurance policy to the board, Cox met with Ward 5 Alderman Scott Maynard, who chairs the city’s budget committee, and was available, along with staff, to answer questions last year as aldermen decided its passage.
He also sent a letter to staff and aldermen outlining the proposed policy. The two-page letter from Sept. 2’s meeting shows his organization acknowledged “domestic partnership eligibility” with all capitalized letters at the bottom of the first page.
A slew of Open Meetings Act complaints against the city in regard to how it used executive session to tend to the plus-one offering, statement of inclusion and discussions on Starkville Parks Commission’s impending takeover were filed after the January meeting.
Carver, Little, Perkins, Vaughn and Wynn voted to repeal the historic policies without any public debate or warning that the board would take such action during the city’s first meeting of the year.
Wiseman also said aldermen offered no reasoning at the table for bringing the changes forward during the three-hour, closed-door session.
Unofficial minutes released after the meeting showed Perkins, who was listed as the authorizing alderman for the plus-one insurance agenda item, stifled discussions by calling for a close to debate and a roll-call vote.
Carl Smith covers Starkville and Oktibbeha County for The Dispatch. Follow him on Twitter @StarkDispatch
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