Last week I went to a meeting at the State House Sponsored by the Idaho Majority Club. The meeting was informative and featured presentations by the co-chairs of the Joint Finance and Appropriations Committee (JFAC), Senator Scot Grow and Representative Wendy Horman. Full disclosure, I have a professional relationship with Mr. Grow’s Accounting firm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We are lucky to have a CPA facile in accounting and auditing to head the committee. Both he and Rep. Horman are competent and able. The process they are trying to ride herd over is the problem. If either ran their businesses or their households using a similar system\u2014in the Federal Government, we called this budgeting system “OPTAR”\u2014operational targets, they would go bankrupt quickly. Both the legislature and the Governor’s Office present budget requests usually based on previous budget requests, and usually asking for a percentage more than they received last round. This encourages asking for more money each year. One is encouraged to spend and not save.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In a private business or a publicly traded company executives are the next to last to be paid\u2014owners and shareholders (who are in fact owners) are always the last to be paid. They get paid not for work produced, but for costs saved, the mitigation of risk, and for creating new markets. In our state government, management gets paid before costs are ever analyzed or before a grade is ever given to management for their ability to cut costs and mitigate risk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In an earlier article that was published on Jan. 3rd<\/sup> of this year, I mentioned the work that House Speaker Mike Moyle has been doing in trying to root out the bureaucratic waste in Idaho government. His efforts have been met with skepticism in some quarters especially in light of the fact that as spending in State government has more than doubled over the past 10 years, the legislators are going to give themselves a 24% pay raise while they are just “nibbling around the edges” of tax relief. They are also going to increase benefits to PERSI and give an across the board pay increase to State government employees!<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the meeting I attended, there was very little mention about cutting costs. At shareholders’ meetings one always hears about efficiencies in production in addition to how to improve margins. I guess when people have their own skin in the game such things matter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Here is an idea. How about (JFAC) starting out with the charge to decrease costs and decrease the size of government in each agency. Depending on the agency I would say that between 1-5% would be easily doable. The idea of eliminating the costs of the programs covered under Medicaid Expansion has been appropriately addressed by Representative John Vander Woude. This program that was supposed to cost Idaho taxpayers $400 million \/ year now costs $1.4billion. The Freedom Foundation has written some excellent articles that show how these programs have taken on a life of their own. I would be interested in seeing how the amount of goods and services being provided to individuals in these programs is increasing each year on a pro capita bases. In other words, each new person that is added to the system is costing the State more on a per capita basis. From a macroscopic view money is being allocated, appropriated, and borrowed and supposedly used, at a higher rate than enrollments in programs. Both Mr. Grow and Ms. Holmes know that businesses can’t grow and compete under such conditions\u2014the only thing keeping Idaho social programs afloat are increased infusions of cash from taxpayers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The day before the Governor’s State of the State Address I noted several areas that needed to be addressed before budgets were passed. I also predicted that the Executive Branch would do everything possible to keep these stories from getting out. I also said that a lazy press\u2014I can’t believe I am saying this but where is Betsy Russell when we need her(?), would not cover the stories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What happened to the $125million dollars lost by the Idaho Health Data Exchange? Never answered<\/p>\n\n\n\n What happened to the LUMA platform that supports all the data across all State Departments and Agencies that is used in procurement, accounting and supply chain reconciliations? How much is that still costing us and is the system even working today? $150million or more?<\/p>\n\n\n\n What about the false billing, aberrant coding, and cost shifting between programs by large providers and insurance companies? Has anyone with a Medicare advantage plan had a “House Call” from a nurse, doctor, or PA to do a “health care evaluation? Why? So, your problem list could be expanded and reimbursements to providers and carriers could be “maximized”\u2014even if you weren’t being treated for those “new” conditions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If these problems aren’t addressed and I see our Attorney General Mr. Labrador has won a case for the people of Idaho against Precision Diagnostics for kickbacks to providers, then we will never be able to save money in State government. The tip of the iceberg I say and what penalties did the providers have to pay? Not knowing the details of the case or the nuances of the penalties and settlements I will not comment any further.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We elect our representatives to represent our interests and not the interests of State Government agencies or employees. By having government agencies audit other government agencies we are losing tons of money in inefficiencies and maybe even malfeasance and frauds. It is time for independent outside audits of these agencies that are continuing to cost Idaho taxpayers millions and now maybe billions of dollars. Many States are moving toward such outside audits\u2014why not Idaho?<\/p>\n\n\n\n No one should know this better than Senator Grow and Representative Holman.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Last week I went to a meeting at the State House Sponsored by the Idaho Majority Club. 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