Dear Neighbor,
To date, Minnesota’s version of Obamacare – MNsure – remains an abject failure with design flaws to the core.
Hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars have been spent, data breaches have occurred, leadership has failed us and the MNsure website has been periodically out of service. And, still, not a single policy card has been issued.
Citizens are on edge as the deadline approaches for Jan. 1 coverage. Insurance agents are increasingly frustrated as they attempt to work with clients, only to encounter a broken MNsure system.
These problems illustrate what is wrong with MNsure: It is an ill-conceived, seriously flawed government design. A well-respected political reporter, Pat Kessler, went as far as to say state officials lied about the preparedness of MNsure. That says volumes.
The website might be salvaged. A new executive director can replace the one who just resigned under fire. But many of the structural issues with MNsure will remain without a total overhaul. Minnesotans still will face higher costs, fewer choices and privacy risks with their personal data.
One serious issue I addressed on the House floor last March pertains to the lack of oversight and accountability with MNsure (click here). The program Gov. Mark Dayton and fellow Democrats enacted lacks traditional oversight. MNsure is not held responsible to the Legislature and its head is an “executive director” instead of a commissioner who reports directly to the governor.
This means MNsure is another shadow agency in Minnesota. It is another new government bureau whose head is not appointed by the governor and has no direct accountability to that office. Yet, Dayton had to have known these key components were missing when he signed this bill.
The House architect of this program assured me on the House floor that MNsure would be held to high scrutiny. I had to ask: If this is such a great deal and they’re going to oversee this health insurance exchange so well, why does every other agency submit their budgets to this body and get approval? Why is this one so special that they don’t get the same scrutiny from this body that every other agency does?
What are the consequences of this quasi-agency going awry? Who is going to hold their feet to the fire, other than the legislative auditor and a seemingly negligent oversight committee? Who is going to challenge MNsure and hold it accountable in cases of wrongdoing or budget abuse?
They say 1.3 million Minnesotans need to enroll by 2016 for MNsure to be financially sustainable. As of Dec. 14, around 39,000 people had enrolled for health coverage through MNsure. Taxpayers could be on the hook for a massive bill if enrollment numbers continue to sag.
Citizens and insurance agents I talk with in our district are at a loss. They don’t know what to do and buyer’s remorse in MNsure is growing. It disappoints me to hear their despair, but the concerns I had from the outset remain valid today.
MNsure continues to hire personnel to answer phones but when you call, don’t be misled by the message “an agent will be with you shortly.” The people you talk to are not insurance agents. They are not licensed by the MN Insurance Commissioner as insurance agents. They are people employed by MNsure to navigate the website and the web of bureaucracy that is our State health exchange.
MNsure proponents continue to assure us that even if you don’t have cards in hand if you paid your premium you are covered, unless the system failed to calculate the premium correctly, such as including your dependents. Then those will not be covered and MNsure currently cannot tell us how to fix that issue.
Simply getting a botched website up and running is not a fix. That is a source of anxiety but even more concerning is MNsure’s basic inability to deliver on the three things Minnesotans care about most in health insurance: Cost, choice and privacy.
Sincerely,
Jeff