The Mississippi County Quorum Court’s Insurance Committee discussed the need for another meeting with Performance Health concerning both paid and unpaid claims.
Mississippi County Judge John Alan Nelson said that payments have been made by the county finance department to the Mississippi County Hospital System and St. Bernards. A number of additional payments have also been made directly to employees for reimbursement on payments they’ve made.
Nelson said the initial plan was to issue all payments to health care providers through the county finance department, but the county insurance carrier, Gerber, settled in arbitration shortly after that plan was put into place.
From there, Performance Health received funds from the settlement and began paying claims. Still, the county would be responsible for a percentage of those payments. Nelson stated that on Nov. 23, Performance Health informed the county that they made two payments using the settlement funds. However, the county has not been fully informed on which claims exactly have been paid and which have not.
“We have a lack of paperwork coming in here so that we can reconcile, that is the problem,” Nelson said.
“His employee could’ve been one of those that was paid, and we could still be getting sued but we don’t know,” justice Michael White said.
“And who’s to say we’re ever going to get that information,” Nelson replied.
White later added, “We’re still getting employees turned in to collection, employees being sued and we can’t defend them by saying that bill has been paid because Performance Health hasn't given us the paperwork to say that.”
County public affairs director Tom Henry added that on the first payment by Performance Health, the county received a spreadsheet that gave the information needed, and they were able to verify the elements. However, the second payment missed a column of information that the county has consistently asked for but has yet to be received.
County finance director Kelli Jones added that 22 employees have turned in copies of bills and proof of payment.
“We’ve just tried to match it up to the claims that were on that list and if everything matched, we went ahead and sent them a reimbursement. Out of those 22, as of Friday Dec. 10, 21 of them will have been paid,” Jones said.
Justice Rick Ash later added, “[Performance Health] is not following through with what they agreed to do in the beginning when we started all of this. It doesn't matter if it’s Gerber’s money that they’re paying or our money, they should still be telling us what’s paid and what’s not. So that we know [where we stand].”
Following the insurance meeting, Judge Nelson also called for a new temporary committee focusing on American Rescue Plan funding.
“It has gotten very cumbersome as far as the rules and regulations, it changes everyday,” Nelson said. “It is going to drag on if we don’t find a way to spend it up. The information between my office and the court sometimes is not as speedy as it should be. So I think the best idea is to form a new committee until all the money is expended.”
The committee includes justices Harbans Mangat, Reggie Cullom, Tobye McClanahan, Cecil McDonald, with Molly Jackson serving as a chairwoman.
The committee also elected to seek a consultant to further ensure the county is within all guidelines of use of the Covid-relief funding. The county will place requests for proposal in statewide publications in search for a consultant.