Economic Services Committee Meeting

February 12, 2003

 

The Economic Services Committee meeting was called to order by Connie Melville.

 

DMA:  (Marjorie Morris)

 

Marjorie provided a Profile of the Breast and Cervical Cancer (BCC) results for 2002.  Marjorie pointed out that the state did operate the program in its first year.  The applicant must be evaluated on all other programs before approval this program.  With this in mind, the state found it very difficult to determine eligibility because they have no way of knowing when other family members are involved or if there is any income in the household.  Therefore, Marjorie is proposing that county’s take over the responsibility of determining ineligibility in all other programs before the applicant is approved for the BCC program.  Policy would have to be re-written and changes would have to be made in EIS.  The committee approved taking over determining eligibility in all programs before the applicant can use the BCC program.  Program results for the first year are listed below: 

 

·         Estimated number of potential applicants:  100

·         Actual number of applicants:   142

Approved:  134

Denied:  1             

Withdrawn:  0

Pending:  7

·         Month with the highest number of applicants:  January (18)

·         Month with the lowest number of applicants:  November & December (8)

·         Estimated cost for the program for the first year:  $1,435,746

·         Actual costs for the program for 2002 calendar year as of 12/24/02:  $992,205

·         Number of applicants who were active as of December 31,2002:  73

·         Average length of time an applicant was on the program:  6 months

·         Average cost per applicant on the program:  $7,405

·         Counties with 5 or more applicants:

Catawba—36

Gaston—11

Haywood—7

Mecklenburg—5

Onslow—5

Wilkes—5

 

A HIPAA “Dear County Director” letter is on the DMA web page.  The letter states that DMA is working on a “Notice of Privacy Practices” letter that will be mailed to all active recipients who are on Medicaid as of February 28, 2003 beginning in March.  Final notices will be mailed to all active recipients by the April 14, 2003 deadline. 

 

The State Employees Health Plan will be mailing a HIPAA privacy notice to North Carolina Health Choice for Children recipients by the deadline. 

 

The Medicaid Consumer Handbook is being revised to include a HIPAA privacy notice for recipients.  Marjorie asked committee members to e-mail her with any ideas on how the Consumer Handbook could be improved NLT February 19, 2003.

 

Federal regulation require that Immigrants receive a notice stating that they do not have to provide their Social Security Number unless they are applying for assistance.

 

DMA has received notification that the MQB-E program has been extended through April 30, 2003.  The QI2 program is gone.

 

Income poverty levels for 2003 have been released and will be sent to the county’s soon.  The adult rate for 100% of poverty changed from $739--$749.

 

Working on a report for Transfer of Resources for those who are receiving in home services.  Hopefully, the report will be ready April 1, 2003.

 

A brief discussion was held on President Bush’s Medicaid proposal.  Basically, it would be a capped program just like WFFA.  Mandatory groups like doctor’s, hospitals and skilled care would be covered. Drugs are not considered mandatory.

 

Quality Control may be checking more cases because of the Improper Payment Information Act of 2002.  The act requires QC to check for eligibility on the date of service.  Medicaid, TANF, Foster Care IVE, and NCHC will be affected.  Currently, the Fed’s want North Carolina to pilot the program. Debbie Chamblee stated staffing would be a problem and that her office cannot pilot this program.

 

Marjorie asked how many counties had clients who were receiving benefits under NAFTA?  Everyone present felt that it was a low number.  She recommended that we contact ESC office to see if our clients are receiving these benefits.

 

A question was asked if Transitional Medicaid was going away?  Marjorie stated that it would continue the way it is.  However, if it does change, the program would revert back to the old four-month method.

 

Another question was asked to see if the Hispanic population was being under served.  Marjorie stated that only 20 counties did not have an interpreter available for the Hispanic population.  After a group discussion the committee did not believe that they were under served at the county level.

 

We cannot purge records until the record retention letter is received at the county level.

 

Division of Social Services:  (Suzanne Marshall)  

 

Work First plan is on the web ready for review.  Suzanne encouraged everyone to review the plan and provide comments back to her through the site.  Public comment period is February 10, 2003 through March 27, 2003.

 

Energy checks were mailed out on time.  The Block Grant plan for LIHEAP has been submitted for next year’s budget.

 

Testing continues on the web based CIP system.  Training for PIR’s will be accomplished on February 26, 2003.   Program Integrity Representative’s will schedule training in each of their respective county’s.

 

The Food Stamp system will change from Citi-bank to e-funds during Easter weekend.    Program Integrity Representatives will be trained on new procedures for the EBT system on February 27, 2003.  PIR’s will train counties in March 2003.

 

Food Stamp Transitional and Simplified reporting will start on June 1, 2003.  Policy will be written once the system is operational.  Policy may be ready for review by the sub-committee in March 2003. 

 

North Carolina will receive $7.4 million in enhanced funding for the Food Stamp program.  However, the money goes into the state general fund, where the General Assembly decides where the money will be spent.  Suzanne stated that they would be presenting a proposal to the General Assembly during their next session.

 

Suzanne reported that FNS stated that we are only serving 52% of the potentially eligible Food Stamp population in North Carolina.  According to this report we are the lowest in the southeast region.  Everyone understands that as caseloads increase, participation rates will be even more difficult to meet.  The state has set a goal of increasing the participation rate by 1-3% next year. Hopefully, FNS we accept this goal.

 

Program Integrity (Linda Peters)

 

Mr. Paul Burge, Director of Burke County DSS, could not attend ESC this month to discuss Program Integrity staffing issues.  In his absence, Linda Peters presented the following information for the committee to discuss:

 

·         There were 33 Program Integrity/Fraud Investigator (PI/FD) positions by 7/01.  Of these, 18.5 were funded with the $25,000 grant.  During this same period 17.5 PI/FD support staff were lost.  Of these, 10.5 were funded with the $25,000 grant.

·         By 7/31/02 an additional 21.5 PI/FD positions have been eliminated.  Of these, 1.5 was originally funded with the $25,000 grant.  During the same period an additional 7 PI/FD support staff were lost.

·         These lost positions total 54.5 PI/FD and 17.5 PI/FD support staff.  Twenty PI/FD and 10.5 PI/FD support staff were funded by the $25,000 grant.

 

Linda wanted everyone to know that Debbie Chamble’s staff gathered this information for us.  If anyone needs a copy of the complete report they can e-mail Debbie at debbie.chamble@ncmail.net.

 

Linda reported that these finding are very troubling. Collecting overpayments is mandated, but having someone dedicated to investigate and collect the overpayments is not.  Linda stated that Mr. Burge hopes that as a group we will be able to take this information and use it to help lobby for the important work that we do and for mandating program integrity positions across the state.  Nearly, $7,000,000 was collected through EPICS between 7/01—6/02 for Medicaid, Work First, and Food Stamps programs.  With fewer staff counties will not be able to continue the important work that is vital for the integrity of these programs and the taxpayers of our state.  If anyone has any questions, they can contact Linda at 828-439-2135 or e-mail her at linda.peters@ncmail.net.  After a short discussion, the committee recommended that Mr. Burge present this information to the Director’s Association for their support and action.

 

Executive Session

 

Old Business: Minutes were approved for the meeting in January 2003.  Please note that Mecklandburg County will be responsible for the minutes in March 2003.  Lenior County is responsible for April 03and Lee County will have May 03.

 

New Business: Everyone was reminded that in order to be a voting member for your county, you must be an NCSSA member.

 

A recommendation was made that each voting member bring a sign with his or her name on it for display in front of him or her.  That way everyone would know who they are and what county they represent.

 

Committee members suggested that Mr. Burge present his findings on Program Integrity to the Director’s Association.

 

Subcommittee Reports:

 

Voted to approve Food Stamp policy sections: 145, 210, 215, 225, 280, 285, 610, 810, 815, 820, 900, & 905.

 

Voted to approve WFFA policy sections: 101,104, 105, 110, 112, 113, 114, 117, 119, 201, 202, 203, & 204.   The policy either removed reference to Auto Food Stamps or made reference to Medicaid policy.