Cass discusses Essential Health

WALKER -- Other counties may be the ones to benefit from the work counties in this area did to try unsuccessfully to provide a local alternative to Medical Assistance.

This is the message Cass County Commissioner Joanne Pels brought back to the board Tuesday after five area counties reaffirmed their decision to abandon the Essential Health Plan.

When the Cass Board asked Pels why she made a motion, which died for lack of a second, to reconsider the plan at the last joint county meeting, Pels reported the most recent figures were more detailed and much more positive.

"Had we had this in February," she said of the recent financial perspective, "I never would have dropped this. There was a whole bunch of numbers that made a huge difference."

Some items that made prospects for success of the county program look dim, she said, included an item every year for five years for purchasing new furniture and comparable expenditures that obviously were duplications.

Cass, Crow Wing, Todd, Wadena and Morrison counties will recover some of their investment in planning for a joint county plan through state and federal reimbursements already approved, said Administrator Robert Yochum.

There also is a possibility these counties can recover some of their expenditures by selling to other counties the planning work ARAZ created for Essential Health Plan counties on how to set up a joint county health plan, Yochum added.