It all started with this nugget I stumbled upon in the Lampasas Dispatch archives (Aug 4, 2017 page 5 column 4) during a City council discussion about the skyrocketing cost of health insurance premiums for City employees (also known as “benefits” – which Finley ALWAYS ignores during any and all discussions of City employee salaries, btw):
“Ms Moreno said premiums will not necessarily increase significantly each year, as she said the main factor is TOTAL HEALTH INSURANCE CLAIMS BY CITY EMPLOYEES. The big increase in premiums for the upcoming year, she said, is TIED TO CLAIMS which Ms Moreno said MORE THAN DOUBLED OVER THE LAST YEAR.” [emphasis mine]
Wow! A DOUBLING of insurance claims in one year. That sounded almost impossible to me, so I wanted to know the actual numbers. Also, if the main factor in the ever-skyrocketing health insurance premiums is CLAIMS by City employees, then maybe we need to have a discussion about WHY claims are doubling. Are there a lot of morbidly obese City employees? Chain smokers? If so, those sure sound like personal choices to me. Maybe the FAIR thing to do is pile more cost onto those people who incur them.
So I emailed my usual City contacts and made a formal records request. I asked for the dollar amount of TOTAL claims made by City employees for the years 2010 through 2019, inclusive. I figured a ten-year span would give me a good look at the trajectory of these costs.
First, I got a run-around about how this might violate patient privacy….which is absurd. I pointed out that the City Finance Director ALREADY opened her cake hole about this IN THE NEWSPAPER. So it hardly made sense that this was top-secret information.
Then, I FINALLY got a response from the City attorney, Jo Christy Brown (who has likely made a small fortune in billable hours to the City, thanks to my requests over the last couple of years being constantly stonewalled). JC gave me the following information:
Fiscal period 2015/2016: $706,186
Fiscal period 2016/2017: $1,113,635
She informed me that records before the 2015/16 period were “are not retained by the City” and that the 2018/2019 period was “not yet finalized”.
I asked about the 2017/2018 period in a response email, since she didn’t mention it. Oh, says JC Brown, “that amount is not available at this time either, according to research done by the City“
Yeah right. Bullshit. Not available two years after the fact??
So of course, my next email asks: Will it EVER be available? Is it just ‘not yet finalized’? Or ‘not retained by the City’ either? Which b.s. line would I get for that year?
Her response: I have no way of predicting that.
This is the point I start laughing at Misti Talbert’s yammering about “transparency in City government” she did on Feb 10th. I mean, really. Ya’ll wonder why I attack you relentlessly on your lies and obfuscation (look it up, Monica) – this is a PRIME example.
Of course, I refuse to take this bullshit as truth. I also see right away that the measly two years of data they give me shows a 58% increase in claims – not the 100% Moreno claims in the newspaper. So either Moreno is atrocious at math since 58% is nowhere NEAR 100% OR Moreno actually does have more data from past years and refuses to divulge it.
SO…I email Moreno (with a CC to Finley – the City manager) and ask her point blank about the discrepancy. I got a lot of “to the best of my knowledge” and “that information is no longer available”…blah, blah blah.
I pressed again by email and got no response for an entire week. I then emailed Moreno and Finley AGAIN to ask if my original email was received. JC Brown was quick to jump in and stonewall for them. I could almost picture Finley hiding behind his desk while JC bullshitted for him. JC tells me:
Your original inquiry seeking medical and life insurance data was received by the City on March 10th, and although your questions did not fall within the Texas Public Information Act, as a courtesy to you, the staff searched for data and asked that I provide you with the limited information that remained available to the staff. I provided that to you via my correspondence dated March 23rd. No additional data will be provided.”
As a courtesy to me! How nice. How DARE the private taxpayer citizen disturb the parasites and loaches who suckle at their teat.
Of course, I strongly disagree that it doesn’t fall within the Texas Public Information Act: Moreno was discussing those figures IN THE NEWSPAPER.
Not to mention: City council SHOULD be using that very information to determine if they are being screwed by their insurance carrier every year during budgeting discussions.
Lastly, YOU JUST GAVE ME TWO YEARS OF DATA, so if it’s unethical to provide this info, then why provide any at all?
Therefore, my lawyer will once again go up against Finley and JC Brown.
It’s pathetic that the City is wasting money paying an attorney to spend time DENYING public information to the public. This is not the first time it has happened either. I know City council reads here. I wonder how they feel about tax dollars being wasted on denying information to the public.
I’ll dissect this further in the next post…and reveal further evidence that these clowns are lying.
