RESIG’s Employee Benefits Department was created in 2008 to offer a dedicated, local service team for our member-districts, their employees, retirees and COBRA members. Rose Burcina, Director and Patty Baumunk, Administrative Assistant are both CA licensed Life & Health agents available to assist with phone calls and walk-ins including active employees, retirees, COBRA members and our district administrative teams. Thirty-two member-districts participate in our fully-insured Medical program while 23 participate in our self-insured Dental program. Additionally, we administer the vision plan benefits for 11 districts. Administrative services are offered at no cost to our member-districts; a fee schedule applies to administrative services performed for non-member-districts. At least three Benefits Managers meetings are held annually to give our district administrative teams updates from our carriers and assistance with the renewal and open enrollment processes.

Health Program

RESIG’s broker, Alliant Insurance Services, negotiates with health benefit program carriers on an annual basis. The current plan period is October 1, 2009 to September 30, 2010. The Health Program includes Kaiser and SISC Blue Shield plans. Kaiser offers three HMO plans and an HSA plan; SISC offers four PPO plans. Kaiser’s Senior Advantage and SISC’s Blue Cross Medicare plans are available for retirees over age 65 with Medicare Parts A & B. Every district offers a Kaiser High Option Plan and 28 districts offer the Kaiser Mid Plan. Sixteen districts currently have participants in the HSA plan, which is totally administered by RESIG. The four SISC Blue Shield plans are available to each district.

Dental Program

Twenty-three member-districts participate in RESIG’s self-insured Dental Program with Delta Dental. The current plan period is October 1, 2009 to September 30, 2010. The Dental Program released $70,000 in dividends to member-districts in 2008-2009. RESIG is currently developing more dental plans to expand our portfolio to include in the upcoming 2010-2011 plan period.

Wellness

RESIG and Kaiser recently partnered for an innovative Wellness Program provided by HealthWorks including the 10,000 Steps program with nearly 1,000 employees participating; the Total Health Assessment is currently open to Kaiser Members of our member-districts and the next phase of the program will offer up to 10 Health Promotion sessions hosted at a variety of district sites.

Upcoming Events

Thursday, August 5  Retiree and COBRA Participants' Open Enrollment Meetings at RESIG

Healthcare Reform, see Hot Topics

Early Retiree Reimbursement Program (ERRP)

As you know, the new Healthcare Reform act includes an Early Retiree Reimbursement Program (ERRP).  Under the program, the federal government will generally reimburse up to 80% of a health plan’s claims for early retiree medical expenses between $15,000 and $90,000.   

RESIG and our broker, Alliant Insurance Services, have worked closely with Kaiser and SISC to determine which districts may have retirees with claims eligible for the ERRP.  I recently contacted ERRP eligible district directly to start the application process – which RESIG may manage on their behalf. 

If your district is not listed below, you were not considered eligible for ERRP at this time and an application will not be filed by RESIG.  If your district is listed below, and you were not contacted, please let me know immediately.

I will continue to contact ERRP eligible districts directly when necessary.  I will not contact the ineligible districts unless necessary to avoid confusion and unnecessary email traffic.  However, you might receive information about ERRP from other sources.  I suggest that you read each closely before discarding it to determine if the information is relevant or not. 

ERRP Eligible Districts:  Alexander Valley, Bennett Valley, Guerneville, Harmony, Kenwood, Mark West, Old Adobe, Petaluma, Piner Olivet, RESIG, Rincon Valley, Roseland, Shoreline, SCOE, Twin Hills, West Sonoma County, Wilmar.

Adult Dependents

The new Healthcare Reform legislation allows the enrollment of adult children up to the age of 26 beginning October 1, 2010, as you know. 

Kaiser, SISC and Delta Dental will allow currently enrolled dependents who would become ineligible for coverage in May, June, July, August or September 2010, to remain on the plan.  There is no activity required by the employee or district to keep the dependents enrolled. 

Dependents that became ineligible for coverage prior to May1, 2010, will be eligible to re-enroll on October 1, 2010.  Verification of the dependents (birth certificates) and an enrollment form must be provided for dependents to re-enroll and they must be re-enrolled by September 31, 2010 without exception.

Once adult dependents turn 26, they will be terminated at the end of the month and must be offered COBRA.

COBRA Subsidy

The ARRA COBRA Subsidy extension expired on May 31, 2010, as you know.  As of July 8, 2010, Congress has failed to come to an agreement on extending the COBRA Subsidy. It is our understanding that it is unlikely that it will be brought up again. 

However, please continue to indicate “voluntary termination” or “involuntary termination” on the COBRA – Retiree Notification Form in case we need to capture that specific information in the future.