News

Fine Landlord Violators

To the Editor:

I am very grateful for the work that the Town of St. Johnsbury is doing to improve the quality of rental housing in Town. I understand that some landlords object to paying a fee to fund code enforcement. I wonder if a better solution would be to collect fines from the landlords who operate unsafe housing. In that way, the few landlords who choose not to keep up their properties would pay at least some of the costs of that choice.

It seems to me that the great majority of landlords in St. Johnsbury maintain their properties in compliance with our housing ordinance. Only a minority of landlords rent out substandard housing.

The Town already has a Civil Ordinance, Section 6-9, which allows landlords to be fined up to $100 per day for violating the housing ordinance. However, it is my understanding that such fines are rarely imposed. It does not seem fair – or good policy – for landlords who routinely violate the housing code to do so without penalty, while the costs of such violations are imposed on others.

Take, for example, a bedbug infested building in town. The brunt of the suffering from those bedbugs is borne by the tenants and their children. Families suffer bites, secondary infections, sleeplessness, the costs of having to throw away much of their stuff, and often the costs of moving to get away from the bugs.

Moreover, bedbugs can easily and unwittingly be carried from one building to another. So the law abiding landlords bear the costs of having to pay for exterminations that could have been avoided had the other landlord exterminated promptly and properly.

In at least one case, a landlord testified about bedbugs in his rental property when he appealed for a lower tax appraisal– and his appraisal was, in fact, lowered. This is an even more direct cost to the Town and taxpayers. It seems wrong that a landlord could testify about a long term bedbug infestation in his rental property and walk out with a lower tax appraisal rather than a big fine.

The town could limit fines to the most serious problems — like lack of heat or water – and situations where the landlord refused to make repairs after being ordered to by the Town Health Officer. Even that could raise a good chunk of the money needed for a part time code enforcement officer – and probably get some buildings fixed up in the bargain.

I talked about this with one landlord who told me that he has never paid a fine in forty years of landlording and that if the Town started imposing fines, it would raise his costs of doing business. I am not sure this is a bad thing. If we make it less profitable for landlords to operate bedbug infested or otherwise substandard housing, perhaps unscrupulous landlords will choose to bring their buildings up to code or sell them to someone who will.

Maryellen Griffin

Staff Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid

St. Johnsbury, Vermont

Public Advocates Take Aim at Blue Cross Rake Hike Request

A public advocate told regulators Thursday that the state’s largest health insurance company does not need to increase premiums 12.7 percent on Vermont Health Connect in 2018.

The advocate from Vermont Legal Aid’s Office of the Health Care Advocate brought in an actuary who said the company could afford to reduce its premium request by about a third — to an 8.7 percent increase.

The actuary testified in front of the Green Mountain Care Board, which regulates hospital budgets and health insurance premiums. The case being considered Thursday affects about 70,000 people who get Vermont Health Connect insurance from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Vermont either on the exchange or through an employer.

Blue Cross is seeking the highest increase it has requested since the company started offering plans on Vermont Health Connect in 2014.

The company originally sought to increase premiums an average of 12.7 percent. The company updated that request to 12.9 percent based on new data. Actuaries for the Green Mountain Care Board said the number should be 12.6 percent, and the company agreed with that analysis.

Blue Cross has cited several reasons for the premium increase, including Vermont’s aging population.

Kaili Kuiper, a lawyer for Vermont Legal Aid’s Office of the Health Care Advocate, said that if the insurer is allowed to raise its premiums that much, customers’ premiums would have increased a cumulative 38 percent since 2014.

She said that while “many factors” in the increase are outside the company’s control, the company’s actuaries have not “applied sound actuarial methodology” and could shrink that premium increase “by increasing the scientific rigor” of their analysis.

Peter Horman, an actuary and the expert witness for the Office of the Health Care Advocate, described several ways that he did the math differently from Blue Cross and arrived at the conclusion the company could cut the increase by 4 percentage points.

Horman said that’s because the company showed “conservatism” in calculating rates. He described the issue like this: “It seems that if they have a concern of something increasing, they’ll reflect it in the rates, but if they have a concern with decreasing, they’ll hold it steady.”

Horman also questioned the company’s methodology to estimate Vermont’s aging population, which he said should be an entire “demographic modeling exercise.” To model the issue accurately, said Blue Cross would need to account for the fact that most people use Medicare when they get to age 65.

Horman said the company’s decision to account for the aging population is simply a concern, not justification for raising premiums.

Additionally, Horman said a premium increase as high as Blue Cross has requested would lead to an “adverse selection spiral,” in which young, healthy customers choose to go without insurance, in turn driving up insurance prices further when older, sicker people remain in the market.

Board members did not ask Horman any questions.

During a tense cross-examination, Jacqueline Hughes, the lawyer for Blue Cross, asked Horman how much money the Office of the Health Care Advocate was paying him for his services.

Horman said he had made $20,000 through June and will bill at least $12,000 more for his services since then. He said he charges about $300 an hour for his time.

Hughes also questioned the financial stability of a company he worked for previously, the Neighborhood Health Plan in Boston. She also asked him about whether the company took losses big enough to require them to raise premiums by large amounts.

Horman said he was working for a financially challenged company at the time. “I’m not sitting here saying I’ve never given a high rate increase,” he said, but “given the high increase, Blue Cross is not incredibly financially challenged.”

Paul Schultz, the chief actuary for Blue Cross, said during his testimony that he did not agree with any of Horman’s results and that the board should not impose the lower premium increase.

“I don’t think Blue Cross is in any danger of an adverse selection spiral,” Schultz said.

The board will hold a special public comment period July 27 and continues to accept public comment through its website, before making a decision at the end of the summer.

Scott Administration: Outside Audit of Vermont Health Connect Tells ‘Story of Improvement’

A recently released external audit of Vermont Health Connect says the state-run insurance exchange has met all requirements set forth by the federal government.

Consumers of Vermont Health Connect have endured a host of troubles since the program launched three and a half years ago. Public perception had run so sour that Republican Gov. Phil Scott ran on a promise of doing away with a state-run exchange altogether.

But a new audit, which examined exchange operations during the last fiscal year, yielded an “unqualified opinion” from the independent firm that conducted the analysis. Cory Gustafson, commissioner of the Department of Vermont Health Access, says that’s “as good as it gets when it comes to audits.”

“The report to me really speaks to a story of continuous improvement at Vermont Health Connect,” Gustafson says.

Two years ago, results of a similar audit were far worse.

Due to a laundry list of operational shortcomings, auditors at the time deemed Vermont Health Connect to be out of compliance with federal regulations.

“The big problems that were seen in 2014 and early 2015 are less and less and less and the service levels are higher and higher and higher,” Gustafson says. [...]

Mike Fisher is the chief of the Office of the Health Care Advocate, a consumer advocacy organization run by Vermont Legal Aid. Fisher says measures of consumer satisfaction continue to rise.

“The numbers continue to get better,” Fisher says. “The number of Vermonters who are caught up in real challenges are smaller and smaller.”

Fisher, however, says those improvements mean little to the Vermonters who still struggle with billing errors, lapses in coverage, or extended delays making changes to their policies.

“For those Vermonters who have a real challenge, that story that the numbers are getting smaller doesn’t matter. They’re still frustrated as can be,” Fisher says. “I both want to congratulate the exchange team for doing some good work and also continue to communicate to Vermonters that more work needs to be done.” [...]

3SquaresVT regional conferences are in Montpelier, Rutland, Winooski

Over the next few weeks, advocates from a range of organizations will have three different opportunities to attend a 3SquaresVT Regional Conference near them to discuss outreach and advocacy for Vermont’s largest nutrition program, 3SquaresVT (formerly food stamps and known nationally as SNAP). The conferences will offer an opportunity for advocates to learn more about how the 3SquaresVT program works, hear from policy experts from the Economic Services Division of the Department For Children and Families where applications are processed, discuss how to address stigma and confront negative myths about the program, learn about advocacy strategies from Vermont Legal Aid, and network with colleagues from their region. New this year, the conferences will also each feature a keynote speaker. Sean Brown, Deputy Commissioner of DCF will speak at the Montpelier and Winooski conferences and Ken Schatz, Commissioner of DCF will speak at the Rutland conference.

3SquaresVT provides benefits to approximately 78,000 Vermonters to buy more nutritious food at grocery stores and farmers markets. The program is successfully reaching many Vermonters, decreasing hunger in our communities and improving the health of children, families and seniors. However, there are still many eligible Vermonters not participating, thus losing out on benefits to which they are entitled and need.

1 in 9 Vermonters is food insecure, meaning they do not always have enough to eat for a healthy and active life. “3SquaresVT is one of the best ways to prevent food insecurity for families, and we must do everything we can to help eligible Vermonters access these benefits,” says Marissa Parisi, Executive Director of Hunger Free Vermont. “By bringing so many advocates together to talk about 3SquaresVT collectively, this conference is helping us achieve that goal.”

The 3SquaresVT Regional Conference series is being organized by Hunger Free Vermont, in collaboration with the Department for Children and Families and the statewide 3SquaresVT Work Group.

About Hunger Free Vermont: Hunger Free Vermont (formerly the Vermont Campaign to End Childhood Hunger) is a statewide nonprofit organization that works with state agencies and community groups to end the injustice of hunger and malnutrition for all Vermonters. Since 1993 Hunger Free Vermont’s outreach programs have substantially enhanced Vermont’s nutrition safety net and increased access to nutritious foods.