O'Brien County OKs insurance premiums | News – nwestiowa.com

PRIMGHAR—Health insurance premiums are on the rise for O’Brien County.

The board of supervisors on March 15 approved a motion to increase premiums for county employees by $10 a month for single plans and $30 a month for family plans.

The county will shoulder the cost for the single plan premium increases while employees will pay the increase for family plans.

Of the county’s 88 total health insurance plans, 17 are for single employees. That means the county will pay an added $2,040 for the year to cover the bump in single plan premiums.

Employees who work less than full time will continue to pay half the premium needed.

The increases will go into effect July 1.

The hike in health insurance premiums comes as the county also is considering wage increases for its employees to keep up with inflation.

The county compensation board recommended a 14 percent increase for the sheriff’s office and 8 percent wage increases for the attorney, auditor, recorder, supervisors and treasurer for fiscal year 2022-23. The supervisors have not yet approved those suggested figures but will approve wage rates later in March.

During the county’s March 8 meeting, supervisor Dan Friedrichsen said he thought an 8 percent increase would be “unbelievably high” when he first heard it. However, he later changed his mind after learning of wage increases some private-sector employees have been receiving to keep up with rising cost-of-living expenses.

Having some employees cover the extra premium costs also would help offset the county’s expenses for wage increases.

Besides approving the health insurance premiums for fiscal year 2022-23 at Tuesday’s meeting, the supervisors received updated information from auditor Barb Rohwer regarding how the county can spend American Rescue Plan Act funding.

Rohwer attended the Iowa State Association of Counties’ spring conference, which was held March 9-11 in Des Moines. One of the discussion topics was the rescue plan funds and updated guidance on how counties can use it.

“The final rule said if you receive less than $10 million — which most of the counties in Iowa did — that you can say that it’s all lost revenue. You don’t have to prove it. It just is lost revenue,” Rohwer said.

There still are restrictions on how the money can be used. For instance, the following uses are prohibited:

Putting the money in a pension.Settling lawsuits.Paying off debt.

Counties also are not able to allocate any of their rescue plan money to mental health regions because funding for the regions recently switched to the state government’s control.

If the county opts to deem the rescue funding lost revenue, Rohwer said the county would no longer need to report to the federal government regarding the money’s use. However, the county still would track how it uses the funding.

“Eligible expenditures would be like culverts and dams, reservoirs, those kinds of things. Any government service as defined by the final rule,” Rohwer said.

Capital expenditures that cost less than $1 million would not require written justification to the federal government, but the county still would need to follow regular bid requirements.

O’Brien County received its first installment of rescue plan funding — $1.3 million — in May 2021 and will receive its second allocation of the same amount this summer.

The county already has approved rescue funding requests to several county departments. It is only considering internal funding requests until March 31, after which it will consider requests from outside organizations eligible for the funds.