Black will not be fall guy

These must have been the worst two weeks in David Black’s life.  What started in February as a new career adventure for the former president and CEO of the Liberty Life Insurance Company in Greenville, dissolved into a nightmare for the Director of the S.C. Department of Insurance who resigned yesterday. 

Weighing heavily on Mr. Black’s decision, one he made last week according to an email he sent to staff, surely was the political troubles of his boss, Governor Nikki Haley. 

Renee Dudley of the Charleston Post and Courier broke what has now become a national story of South Carolina accepting a $1 million planning grant from the feds to determine if the state would establish and operate a health insurance exchange in 2014 or let the federal government do it.  The exchange, a market place for obtaining health insurance, is an integral part of the Affordable Care Act, Obamacare to many.

But emails of March 31 of this year—obtained by Ms. Dudley through the Freedom of Information Act—clearly show that Governor Haley had no intention of South Carolina creating an exchange.  The problem is that in an Executive Order on March 10^th she established a Health Exchange Planning Committee, as called for by the grant, to “develop and submit a report to the Governor by October 28, 2011 which sets forth the Committee’s recommendation regarding whether or not the State should establish a health insurance exchange.”

The planning committee, including Mr. Black, was totally in the dark about the Governor’s earlier decision—except for one member, Tony Keck who is the Director of the South Carolina Department of Health and Human Services.  Mr. Keck, a former member of Governor Bobby Jindal’s administration, participated in the March 31 email discussion with the Governor and her staff. 

The political firestorm that has continued to burn following Ms. Dudley’s story has now consumed its first victim. 

It was Mr. Black’s insurance department that received the federal planning grant money and hired a key staffer (who also had no knowledge of the Governor’s ruse) to be in charge of the planning grant and committee.  Mr. Black and his insurance department will now have to respond to a possible federal investigation of misusing taxpayer dollars as called for on December 22 by U.S. Senator Tom Harkin.  On December 23 the Chairman-Elect of the S.C. Legislative Black Caucus sent Mr. Black a letter requesting a full briefing on this issue.

Mr. Black didn’t sign up for all this.  He certainly was not a knowing party to this charade.   And he never really fit into the highly partisan Governor’s operation as dis Mr. Keck.  My experience with Mr. Black has been very positive.  A very affable person, he demonstrated a professional responsiveness to his duties and those who interacted with his department.  There was never even a hint of partisanship in his actions.

So now Mr. Black has done the honorable thing.  Instead of trying to mold himself into the continuous campaign mode of Governor Haley’s administration and trying to defend her duplicity in this matter, he resigned.   

But the buck doesn’t stop with Mr. Black.  Who will the fire burn next?

Bi-partisan action on health care

This week I had the opportunity to talk with David Black, South Carolina’s new Director of the Department of Insurance. First impression—he’s very tall. Second impression—congenial, intelligent, and well informed on issues in spite of only being on the job for a few weeks. Did I mention his height?

Mr. Black made it clear that his agency was moving forward with the nearly $2.5 million in planning grants it has received from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services for implementing some of the requirements of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). I talked about these grants in my February 25th blog.

This is very good news and reflects Governor Haley’s recent comment that the ACA is the law of the land.

We found common ground on the health insurance exchange the ACA instructs to be in place by 2014. A healthy public discussion on how the state should establish a transparent market place for individuals and employees of small businesses to purchase health insurance is productive. Even if the ACA didn’t exist, a South Carolina health insurance exchange is a good idea.

This leads me to the biggest legislative health care news of the week. A House Ways and Means subcommittee yesterday voted unanimously (yes, that means a bi-partisan vote) to send a bill creating a health insurance exchange to the full Committee. The bill that will go before the full Committee probably next week is a slightly amended version sponsored by Republican Brian White. The original bill, filed on February 24, was sponsored by Democrats Harold Mitchell and Gilda Cobb-Hunter. Now 23 other Republicans and Democrats have signed onto the bill including Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dan Cooper (R-Anderson).

This fast action on a well designed bill in the House is significant because a health insurance exchange needs to be operating by the middle of 2013 so that it can meet the January 1, 2014 deadline set in the ACA. Important and controversial bills usually take 3 or more years to be enacted. We simply do not have that much time.

The House should be congratulated for its quick action. If it can move the bill to the Senate soon, the subcommittee hearing process in that body most likely will allow for that healthy public discussion of how the insurance exchange should operate for our state. Passage of a bill early next year (or possibly even this year) would put us on track to provide South Carolinians with an exchange that should increase competition in health insurance and help us make better informed decisions as to the coverage we want.