Racine Health Care Costs & Teacher Layoffs

Scott Niederjohn [PDF]:

Facing a budget shortfall of $7.2 million this year, the Kenosha school district asked each of their labor groups to switch their health insurance provider from the WEA Trust to Minneapolis-based United Healthcare. The coverage offered by United Healthcare has the same benefits and cost sharing provisions as the WEA Trust plan currently used by the district’s employees. All of the labor groups within the district, except for the teacher’s union, chose to make this change and save the district over $3 million in benefit costs. Another $3 million would have been saved if the teacher’s had switched to this identical insurance plan as opposed to remaining with the union owned insurance provider.

The most remarkable part of this story is that because the teachers chose not to make this switch, the district has been forced to layoff 40 teachers to alleviate their budget shortfall.

Posted by Jim Zellmer at June 26, 2006 10:16 PM
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