001Good evening, everyone. We're going to call to order this meeting of the College Station ISD Board of Trustees. Declaration of a quorum, we have seven members present. Welcome to this meeting of College Station Independent School District Board of Trustees. We were elected at large to represent the interests of our community and our state in educating our students. Our mission for our students in this district is success each life, each day, each hour. We adhere to all pertinent laws, policies, and procedures in posting agendas and conducting our meetings. The detailed agenda information was made available to us at least three business days in advance, and we have all come to this meeting informed and prepared. We have just completed a workshop session where we heard reports and discussed much of the information needed to make decisions
002in either this meeting or in upcoming meetings. This is a meeting of the seven trustees in a public setting rather than a public meeting. As such, public comment is included on the agenda at a specific time and requires us to listen rather than take action, so as to abide by the Open Meetings Act. We are pleased that you have taken time this evening to join us. We are very proud of this school district, and we thank you for your interest in and support of our students. And that is going to lead us to our recognitions. We have some students from our bilingual summer school who are going to lead us in our pledges. >> Hello, my name is Maria Saenz, and I'm the sum the summer language academy uh a coordinator. Um our program is
003housed this summer at South Noe Elementary and we serve four, five, and six-year-olds. And currently there's about 180 students, more or less, enrolled this summer. And these are two of the students that are currently participating in the program. Can we take this off? >> My name is Madeline and I'm 6 years old. >> My name is Khaleel and I'm 6 years old. >> Please stand for the pledge. >> Okay, together. Together, go. >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America. And to the republic one stands under God, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Honor the Texas flag. I pledge allegiance to the Texas flag. One state under God, one and indivisible. Please remain standing. For a moment of silence. Thank you, may be seated. >> [applause]
004>> President Ege, members of the board, and our guests here with us tonight and watching online, it's always an honor and a privilege to recognize the outstanding accomplishments of our students here at our board meetings. And tonight, we are proud to recognize the College Station High School boys golf team following an exceptional season ex- exceptional season that culminated at the UIL 5A state tournament. This season they two the Cougars captured the Region 3 5A championship and finished seventh overall in the state, an impressive achievement that reflects months of hard work, dedication, and teamwork. So, student athletes, as I call your names, if you will come forward to be recognized, you'll receive a certificate from Dr. Harkrider, and you can make your rounds to shake the board members' hands. If you'll just wait over here, we'll
005take a group picture after everybody receives their certificate. So, first, we have Gage Elizondo. >> [applause] >> Gage finished as the UIL 5A state tournament individual runner-up, shooting a two-day total of 139, five strokes under par. He's also named honorable mention academic all-state first team all-state and earned a spot on the THSCA super elite team. KELLER HENSON. >> [applause] >> KELLER RECORDED A PERSONAL BEST ROUND of 72 at even par at the state tournament and was named a second team named to the second team academic all state team. BRAXTON MERRIMAN >> [applause] >> BRAXTON WAS NAMED WAS NAMED district 17 5A newcomer of the year and earned first team all district honors. Orin Merriman >> [applause] >> Bentley Andrews >> [applause] >> Eli Rodgers >> [applause] >> And their coach Zach Marlow is here with
006us tonight. COME ON FORWARD ZACH. >> [applause] >> CONGRATULATIONS TO THESE STUDENT ATHLETES and their coach on an incredible season. Your accomplishments on the course, in the classroom, and as representatives of College Station High School in College Station ISD have made us proud. >> [applause] [snorts] >> I'd also like to take a minute to recognize the artwork that was provided by our bilingual summer school and enrichment summer school and that is at the back of the board room. So be sure and take a look at that as you are leaving tonight. That's going to move us to item D1 which is our board reports. I'll start with Head Start Policy Council. They the Head Start continuation grant was awarded. Um enrollment is strong. We have Head Starts wait listed and early Head Start has a
007wait list. Attendance is 93% and um things are going well with that program. >> Alrighty, I can report on DEIC met last week. We met by Zoom and the whole meeting was discussing the plans for all of our federal funding streams, Title 1, 2, 3, and 4. They are all you know have their specific focus areas, but I think one of the things that stood out to me is that the the new district behavior coordinator role that we had approved is going to be coming out of the combination of Title 2 and Title 4 funds and really the reminder on the process behind that that over the last many months DEIC and the programs had been had surveying surveying teachers, surveying uh members of the committee on and and parents as well on how we
008thought those funds could be best utilized and supporting behavior really supporting teachers and with the you know some working on behavior improvements in the classroom. I think was was one that came to the top and so that's where that position really came out of. Um and I think the only other thing I'll add and I don't know if you all are going to mention it, but I went to the next step in this TASB's legislative advisory council group, and that's where we we met in San Antonio last week with again board members from across the state and just refining the ask of what we at least at this point what we want to focus on asking our legislators. Of course, our school district we can have our our own, but this is what school board
009members are asking TASB really to to um to work on. Really no surprises, but we do but we do learn a lot from hearing from other school districts. Most of us have all of the same needs, but some have some specific other requirements, and so we're trying to trying to capture all those together. And I'll As soon as we get the latest version of that, I'll share with the board. >> Yeah, what Ms. McAdams is referring to while she was um doing those legislative priorities, Ms. Wilson and Ms. Simmons and I did travel to the Summer Leadership Institute um put on by TASB and did some board officer training and just brought back some um great things I think that we're able to take from that. So, it was a good training. >> I can
010report on Education Foundation. Um we did the proper send-off for Teresa Bendon as they held a retirement party for her um on May 20th, and lots of community members and CSISD staff as well as donors were all in attendance, so it was a great night to celebrate Teresa. I know Amy Hay is hard at work as their fiscal year uh is approaching the end on June 30th, but they are already planning ahead for next year. Um and they already had their strategic planning session um on June 9th. So, they have hit the ground running. Excited for next year. All right, then Dr. Harkrider. >> Yes, ma'am. Although our district calendar may be pretty light this time of the year, we've got lots going on behind the scenes with hiring, construction, and planning for the 26-27
011school year. >> All right, that's going to bring us to item D2, which is consideration, discussion, and possible action related to school board meeting schedule for 26-27. Mr. Denson? >> Thank you, President Iggy, members of the board. This is our last meeting of the 25-26 school year and our board calendar. And so, you do have a memo that outlines that all of the meetings would for the next school year fall on the third Tuesday of each month with the exception of Tuesday, August 25th, which is the Tuesday after the first day of school, and Tuesday, March 9th, which is the Tuesday before spring break. We just moved those for the holiday and because we didn't want to do a board meeting the day before the first day of school. So, so our recommendation is that
012the College Station ISD Board of Trustees approve the third Tuesday of each month as the regularly scheduled workshop and meeting dates with the exceptions that I mentioned. >> Motion to approve as presented. >> Second. >> All right, I have a motion to approve the school board meeting schedule for 26-27 first by Dr. Payne and a second by Mr. Martindale. Any questions or comments? All right, all in favor, please say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? That will pass 7-0. >> Thank you. >> Um item E is our hearing of citizens. We do not have anyone signed up to speak tonight, so we're going to move to the consent agenda. Um that includes items G, item H2, I1 to I2, and J3 to J13. >> Motion to approve as presented. >> Second. >> All right, I
013have a motion to approve the consent agenda by Dr. Payne and a second by Ms. Simmons. Any further discussion? All in favor, please say I. I. Any opposed? That will pass 7-0. And that is going to bring us to item H1, which is um an end of the year map data presentation. Mr. Mann. >> All right, good evening. Thank you, President Eagy, Dr. Harkrider, and members of the um school board. It is my pleasure to come to you this evening and get to be the voice of fantastic work on behalf of our teachers and our students this year. It really was a great pleasure to be able to see just how much growth we've experienced over the course of this school year. Um and so just like I did last year, um I like to
014bring this report up because it shows the data in a different light um and through the achievement desiles process. And so kind of walk you through the different phases of it cuz it is a different way to look at it, but I think it tells a really good story as to how NWEA measures growth and how it helps us to see just how much our students are growing. >> [clears throat] >> Just to orient everybody to the information that you see on the screen um because it is a little bit different. Um so this graph visualizes the achievement desiles. And so what you see at the very top are the students that fall from the zero to ninth desile and on the bottom the 90th to the um 100th or actually the 91st to the
015100th desile and all in between. Um and so as we go through the graphs, you're going to see these um same desiles populate through. And the way that um MAP likes to describe this is that if our school district was representative of the entire United States, each desile would contain approximately 10% of the students. And that's based upon their data that they've collected over many, many years. And so I highlighted, if you notice there's that black line that's on every slide, um but I just pulled it out to draw all the attention to the 10% line um because that black line indicates where they see the data and what we want to see is as far away from that line as possible on either side. Okay, so I have a graph that shows that. But
016what is depicted here on this image is the distribution of CSIC student by achievement decile over the fall. And so the way this works is we take our fall assessment in August and September whenever the campus is taking it in their testing window and where the students test on their achievement, they stay in that decile the entirety of the year no matter how much they grow in the winter, how much they grow by the end of the year. And the reason for that is so we can do an apples-to-apples comparison to how much did students that are in that decile grow. Because if they went from the the 20th decile to the 50th decile to the 80th decile, then they're constantly shuffling and you can't truly say that Jeff grew this much. But keep me
017in the same decile from the beginning and you can say that. And so that's what this says here is this allows us to report where we see and one of the things that our map rep always reminds us is that we see very atypical growth in our district which for us we feel like well this is not enough. We want to see more. You know, but it's a good reminder that we are doing a great job with our kids. Our teachers are doing a fantastic job and our students are working really hard. And so what I said a moment ago, that black line, the 10% okay, NWEA says that the further away, right? The more important. So whenever we look at the tops and the bottoms of this curve, what we're talking about is how
018far are those lines away from that black line. And so CSISD has seven of our 10 achievement deciles that are more than 2% from that black line in the middle. And so what that means is that we have fewer students that are struggling learners in the top that we're seeing that the zero, 10s, and 20s, and 30s, and we have more students that are very successful high-achieving learners in the 70th, 80th, and 90th percentile than what MAP typically sees in their data. And so the bottom line is we want to see both of those arrows going in that direction, right? So graphically, visually, that's what you want to see. That's That's the indicator that thing is going well. Okay? Everybody makes sense on that? We're going to jump into some of it. Okay. So as
019you are very well familiar with goal two, um we are focused on our historically underperforming student groups, and so we're monitoring that, and what you're looking at here is our groups of students. And so you'll see under here the label of the student that's here corresponds with the graph that's right above it. And so you can see here this is a small population set for us. Our American Indian Native American population is a small number of students in comparison to the rest of them, um but you can see that we have a distribution that it isn't what we just described, but you see the the great difference of distribution with our Asian population of students here. And then you see our African American students, which is one of our historically underperforming student groups, and it
020is pretty much the opposite of what we want to see. And we've seen this in the past, um and we're working hard to continue um to improve this, and I think that you'll see some of the improvements that we've made this year. Um and then you see there's more of that even distribution of our Hispanic populations here in College Station ISD. And then our multiethnic students um is more along the curve that we um would like to see and expect to see with our distribution, and then you can see our white students on the bottom. So those um are the growth deciles that they are set in and so as we go through and we look at the different graphs, that's what you're going to look at. Um, and the other part that we're going
021to talk about is the growth bar. What you see different here is NWEA reminds us that anything above the 50th percentile is a good thing. We want to see numbers well beyond 50 when it comes to growth. And so what we're seeing here, this graph represents all of our students, all of our tests, tens of thousands of tests that are in here, and we are well above the 50th percentile in every one of our areas, which is great. Last year we had some yellows in here. Okay, so we've gotten all of our deciles pushing even further within our growth, which is a fantastic piece. And I get ahead of myself. There's your 50th percentile bar. And so this is the reminder as a parent, you've probably seen this on your MAP Growth reports, um, but
022like for everybody to know that the yellow piece, this is average growth. And what MAP means by average growth is what we should expect a student to grow within about a year's worth of time. Whenever we see the high average growth, then that's a year and a quarter to about a year and a half, give or take, and then the blue is well beyond a year and a half worth of growth. We want to see greens and blues as much as possible. Yellow is not a bad thing, but we like to be green and blue in all of our graphs. And then the other piece that you'll see for this presentation is I compared our spring, which is the end of year assessment, to our winter. So every slide, for whatever assessment that we're looking
023at for growth, the spring will be on top, so the most recent assessment compared to our middle of the year assessment. And then again, the reminder, we'll look to see if we have any of these bars drop below that black line. So that's what you want to be looking for. And again, it's not typical for us to see this many of these deciles well beyond the 50th percentile. So, NWEA reminds us of that quite a bit. We had tremendous amount of growth this year. So, let's get into it with our inner-performing student groups. So, you can see back here again, this is our growth in their achievement deciles. So, our native um native Native American American Indian students. And so, you can see their winter. And what you notice is the yellows have disappeared, and
024we have more length in our blues and and our greens. And seeing the blue, remember that's indica- indicative of a year and a half or more of growth. And so, what's really great to see is whenever these zero, 10s, and 20 lines are green and blue, this tells us that our academic interventions with our highest struggling learners is really working because in order to get these kids out of these top deciles, we have to grow them more than a year to get them caught up with their peers that are growing at least a year's pace. Does that make sense? We want to see greens and blues at the top, very much so. And so, you can see the difference from the winter to the spring. These are our Asian students, and so you can see
025the pocket of students in the middle um that accelerated their growth, but you can see just about every one of our deciles improved over their performance in the wintertime. Our Hispanic students, again, we can see improvement from the winter to the spring with all of them moving in um to the high-growth area. And our African American students, and so this is our winter, and you can see where we are with our spring. And so, this is what I was saying, our data is showing what we're doing is helping, it's working, it's just taking longer than we want it to, but we're getting them there. We're working hard to close as as many gaps as possible. And then our multiethnic students, again, you can see that top bar is very blue and very long. So our
026most struggling kids in this this um student group have really done a great job with embracing their learning this year, which is a fantastic thing to see. And then you can see with our white students. And so what these slides tell me is the work that we're doing to close their gaps with struggling students is really working on their growth scores. They're making lots of academic growth. Okay, any questions about our struggling student groups before I move on to subject specific? Okay. So with math >> Actually Jeff, can I ask one thing? I guess I'm a little a little con- I'm a surprised actually that some of those have enough data points like for that we cuz there's so few students in say the um um American Indian and >> Mhm. >> uh >> But
027this is every test and this is over the course of the year. So so like fall, winter, spring, they're looking at the and the different subject test. >> So between all of that one kid multiple tests could fall into different >> reading, math, science, yes. >> So so it's per test, not necessarily per student. >> Correct. Yeah, one student yes, yes ma'am. That's correct. Mhm. >> [clears throat] >> Um so with math, our K to 8 math, um you can see here our winter in the bottom and we do have that yellow bar right up there at the top. Um and that is certainly something that has received our attention as to what's going on and digging in with those groups of students. Um and I can tell you that this has been indicative of
028what we've seen on STAR with our seventh grade math. A lot of those students are going to be in that range right there for us. And so we're aware well aware with that. Um the good thing is is with the other deciles that we're seeing either sustaining the growth or improving the growth. But we're very much aware of what we need to pay attention to and you can see um this graphical representation shows us um the percent um by ethnicity for our math students and it gives us again by decile 0 10 all the way through to the 90th decile and it heat maps it for us so that then we can see just where those student groups are falling and we compare this to the previous years to help us see are we gaining
029traction is what we're doing working or not working so that we can continue to make the adjustments that we need to make. Uh with Algebra 1 our winners are on the bottom and you can see our algebra teachers put a tremendous amount of work in with our students to push into their growth and we're seeing lots of students with tremendous amounts of growth over the course of the year this year with Algebra 1. And you can see that represented in our heat map broken down by ethnicities and our deciles and so we have lots of fabulous growth with Algebra 1 this year. And then our Algebra 2 which a lot of these students that are in this top piece are juniors and seniors and they're struggling learners and they are picked up their growth and
030so again this is telling us that the work that we're doing to target in on these students is paying off. It's really helping with what we need to see with them and you can see the shift in the color changes from the winter with so much of the yellow into the green and into the blue. And so this is telling us that our spring semesters are really pushing our kids where they need to be and whenever we break it down into our ethnicity groups we see the the differences there. And with geometry same story different subject but that I love that same story different subject. As we got lots of growth going on here and we can see it both at the both ends of the spectrum right and so this is a very positive
031thing for our students in geometry to see how much they picked up from the winter assessment into the spring assessment. And then again we break it down by our student groups. >> [snorts] >> Any questions about math before I move on to reading? Okay? So, in reading K-12, um because we do have reading assessments that go all the way through 12, they're all together, unlike math where it breaks off into the subject-specific once they get beyond the eighth grade. Um but you can see very much in line with math, um lots of growth over the course of the year from the winter assessment into the spring assessment. Um very strong across all of our deciles with all of our students. Uh the only way this would be any better is if we saw more of
032the blue up here at the top. That's just me being nitpicky, right? But we want to see that that amount of growth. Our Spanish growth, and I've got this at the end in our areas that were um we know we got to continue to improve on, this is one of the areas that we know we've got a lot of work to do is to improve the reading with our Spanish growth our Spanish reading students. Their growth scores, again, yellow is a year's worth of growth. We expect more than that. We want to see more than that, right? And so, um this is something that we know we've got a lot of work to do. It's not that it's bad, but it's not where we want it to be. And [snorts] then we can see the
033breakdown of our K-12 reading right there about the achievement bands, the ethnicities, and then we see it with our Spanish. And so, this helps us to break down with our kids where to focus and what we need to be working on next year. Any questions about reading before I move on is less data points there cuz it's all K-12 and then Spanish. Okay? And then with science, um building upon what we have seen the last couple of years of science, um tremendous growth. Again, we've got the the top decile right there where we've got some attention and everyone knows Amanda Gibson. She's all over it, right? She understands um the work to be done there, but it's it's fabulous fabulous growth that we're seeing amongst our science in K8 and again we're breaking it apart
034across the deciles by our student groups to help us understand um our areas of work. And then you can see our growth in biology and I mean our biology teachers like if this doesn't get you excited I don't know what does from the from the winter into the spring just the amount of growth that we're seeing across all levels in science. It's fantastic to see that come across. >> [snorts] >> And so then we see it amongst our different student groups in our achievement bands. Um so to summarize it up right comparing like it says spring 26 to spring 25. So if you look closely at the data you can see here this is this spring 6.2% of our students are in this lowest decile where last year 7.2% of our students were in that
035lowest decile. So what we're doing is working. It's making a difference. It's helping our kids. It just doesn't happen fast enough for us. But this just tells us that we are on the right track. The work we're doing is making the impact that we want to see because we see the more of the distribution across what we would expect to see from NWEA's database. And so then when we compare right all of our assessments again spring 26 to 25 this is the norm. So I know that this was a conversation we had whenever I was here in the wintertime about wanting to make sure that last year's norm data was in for this year and it absolutely is. Both of these slides this is to the new norms. This is to the new norms. I
036even verified with our map folks. Everything is there because we want to do an apples-to-apples comparison. And they assured me that everything in there is adjusted and they're very impressed with what they see. And wrapping it up overall data our ethnicity by campus oh I see camps sorry about the typo there at the top. Um I'm always most critical of my own work but the great thing is you can see just how much growth is occurring across all of our campuses with all of our students. And this is what we want to see. We want to see everybody growing. Whenever we mean all kids, it is all kids. And that's what we're really pushing in on. And so then you can see the campus by subject and the amount of growth that we have there.
037And we're going to keep pushing in. We know where our hot spots are. This is the line in with what we're seeing in our star data, so we know the work ahead of us. Um but it's all good stuff and I'm very very excited to see um how the data's coming through. And it points it up right here in our summary. Our students are growing consistently. We're accelerating our growth over the course of the year. Um we are being successful with our goal two, even though it's not where we want it to be. Um and we know that we've got work to do and we've got to dig in on our Spanish reading because that is certainly not where we wanted it to be um with our non-native English speakers. Those are the students that
038are struggling the most in that area. So with that, I'll ask any questions or comments you guys have as a board. >> It's a lot to process. >> It is. >> We've had this presentation to look at. Um there's a lot of exciting things there and I appreciate your comments on uh the goal of serving [snorts] our, you know, traditionally um low-performing students. And um so I love seeing that. I don't know that I have a question. It Anybody Anybody else? Nope. Well, thank you, Mr. Mann. >> You're welcome. >> All right, that is going to move us to item J1, which is consideration and possible adoption of the 2026-2027 general fund, food services, and debt service fund budgets as presented in the public hearing that we had in our workshop. Ms. Wilson? >> Sure.
039Good evening, Ms. Ekey, Board of Trustees, Dr. Harkrider. Um I would just like to bring the budgets back up that we had. Sorry. >> It's okay. Here you >> We did meet earlier this evening and listened to a presentation over the budget and this is just basically the adoption of the budget. We are legally required to adopt a general fund budget, special revenue, not a special revenue, excuse me. Food service budget as well as a debt service. And so here is the general fund budget. We We adopt the budget by function. It's at 8.3 million, but I do want to point out again that 2 million of that is a roof project that is going to be uncommitted in our fund balance enrolled over. We actually received revenue through that in the previous year and
040we're going to roll it forward this year. So that accounts for 2 million of that $8 million deficit. Our debt service fund is a $2.5 million deficit, but as brought up in our workshop earlier tonight, I do want to point out that because of our payments flip different school years, um we make a payment in August for the taxes that we had already received in the previous year and then we make we collect taxes for future payments. Um so that is why they don't line out. But it's a $2.5 million deficit and then our food service budget is a balanced budget. Are there any questions? >> Move to approve as presented. >> Second. >> Okay, I I have a motion to approve as presented the 2026-2027 budgets. Uh motion by Dr. Payne and second by
041Ms. Simmon. Um would also just encourage anyone who is interested in hearing more about that to go back and look at the workshop from earlier because we had a lot of great um discussions and questions in that. But is there any further discussion here? Okay. All in favor, please say I. I. Any opposed? That will pass 7-0. Moves us to item J2 which is consideration and possible approval of the 2026-2027 employee health care insurance. >> Yes ma'am, we have Ross Gunnels here to present tonight. Shut up there. >> Good evening everyone. Thank you to the trustees and Dr. Harkrider for allowing our team to present at this evening's meeting. With me I have Ronnie O'Neal as well as Todd Gunnels here on from the Anco team as well as Camby and Dina from Baylor Scott
042and White. >> [snorts] >> A little over 5 months ago the district hired Anco to represent them on their employee benefit health plans and help with this year's renewal. The district's coming off a 2-year rate cap with Blue Cross Blue Shield and on last year's renewal the prior broker negotiated an uncapped renewal for 2026. Due to the district's heavy claims of a 109% medical loss ratio along with the nationwide trend of health care increases Blue Cross Blue Shield released an initial renewal increase in the response to the public RFP of 37%. While this seems shocking it is not uncommon as we are seeing large increases across districts as well as private employers. As part of the RFP we know that 17 carriers received the request for proposal. We received 13 declined the quotes. Four quotes
043total were received. The carriers that quoted were Blue Cross Blue Shield, Baylor Scott and White, EMI and Curative. After evaluating all the bids and coverages Baylor Scott and White was the recommendation. I'm going to go through some slides to give some background. After the best and final offers were received, Blue Cross Blue Shield did lower their overall rate increase to 27.9%. Over the past 3 years that the district has been with Blue Cross Blue Shield, if you add in this increase, the trend increase or total increase is 47.1%. We also benchmarked the bid from Baylor Scott & White versus the TRS plan for this region, and there was over 1.64 million in savings. This chart shows you the 3-year rise in premiums, and we take an employee only enrolled in the PPO plan currently with
044Blue Cross Blue Shield so that you can see the monthly cost increase each year over year. The first year rate cap on the plan was a 6%. Of course, that is what Blue Cross Blue Shield delivered, and then 8 and 1/2 in year two, and then when the un-capped renewal was received, there was a 27.9% increase given. So, why Baylor Scott & White? So, after 22 years in this industry, I can tell you that the number one question I get is how much is coming out of my paycheck. So, a lot of times on health care premiums, the first thing people ask is how much is coming out of my paycheck for the plan. There's a constant battle on health insurance between the cost of health care versus the cost to use health care and
045the access to care. The base or the lowest cost plan with Blue Cross Blue Shield last year was a high deductible health plan, which means that there are no co-pays and no first dollar coverage for people up front. A lot of people, unfortunately, when they make their benefit plan decisions, and we talk to them on a regular basis, choose the lowest cost plan because that's what they think is best for the care. But with Baylor Scott & White, one advantage is the base plan is now a copay plan option with rich first dollar coverage. For example, when you're on a high deductible health plan and you go to the doctor, it might be $200 to see the doctor. Whereas on the base plan with Baylor Scott & White, if you have kids under the age
046of 18, it's a $0 copay, which is a huge advantage to someone picking between those two plans. So, some other benefit enhancements you'll see and I mentioned there are the $0 dependent copay on anyone on a copay option taking their kids to pediatrician under the age of 18. With the plan and one thing that is confusing with Baylor Scott & White, there are three different network options. Two of those plan options would be the premier HMO, which has a smaller network, the plus HMO, and then the access PPO. One thing and one question we commonly get in our industry around Baylor Scott & White is, do I not have access to MD Anderson? On the access PPO plan, the fourth option, you do have full access to go to MD Anderson. You also have nationwide
047access if you leave the Scott & White service area through United Healthcare's PPO network. So, that's a common misconception. There is an option on the plan that you do have service well beyond Texas and you can freely go in the largest PPO network in the country. How would How does the 5.4% increase with Baylor Scott & White compared to TRS? We wanted to show that as a benchmark. TRS for this region received a 12% increase roughly versus overall 5.4% increase if the plans are elected with Baylor Scott & White. Also in the proposal, there's a medical loss ratio gain share, which is kind of confusing, but basically if the district plan runs under 72.5% loss ratio, the district actually gets money back from Baylor Scott & White, which then could be rolled into health plan
048premiums for the next year. >> [snorts] >> Also, Baylor Scott & White was the only plan that put second-year rate caps in place. So, as we see the benefit of bad years and rate caps with Blue Cross, where it was a 6% and an 8% increase, Baylor Scott & White has guaranteed a no bigger premium increase than 11% to 14.6% depending on the type of plan. $0 member care, I hit on this for for kids, but also telemedicine and virtual care is all $0 copay under the copay options with Baylor Scott & White. And a major one in my opinion, and a place that we see major issues, is diabetes. And so, not to be too public, but last year the largest increase in care costs for College Station ISD was diabetes. And so, Baylor
049Scott & White has a program built into their copay options called Be Well. It's open for enrollment two times a year, and if a member enrolls, all their diabetic supplies, their medications, their testing is included at a $0 copay, which is a huge benefit to those members. And as we see with diabetes management, when people defer care, don't take their insulin, that condition gets out of control, and what happens is the claims go up, therefore the district gets a larger premium increase at their renewal. Pharmacy transparency with lower RX copays on most plans. And then, local scale. So, Baylor Scott & White, we're seeing a growing trend in this area where larger employers are adopting the the regional healthcare plan, and they do have localized service. So, what changes for the plans? When you compare
050the last year's four plans, the Blue Cross Blue Shield we have in the left column there, we have a $1,500 deductible HMO versus the $1,500 with Baylor Scott & White. An employee electing that plan would actually see, and I'll be it, not much, but a $3 decrease in per paycheck cost. On the $2,500 deductible copay plan, the lowest option, there'll be a $3.10 increase per employee only per paycheck. On the HSA or the high deductible plan, the deductible is going up from $3,300 to $3,400. That's requirement of IRS due to embedded deductible loss, so that's the reason that in increase in deductible, but the out-of-pocket's the same. You do see an increase there at $37 on that plan. And then the PPO option, which has the broadest network, is going from a $1,500 to $2,000
051deductible. There are similar copays, and the out-of-pocket is $500 higher. That plan is receiving roughly a $49 increase on an employee only cost. The reason we list employee only instead of all four tiers is out of the 1,400 plus employees in the district, over 1,000 are enrolled in employee only coverage. So what does the network look like when you overlay it versus the actual claims that the district had with Blue Cross Blue Shield on the premier plan? Roughly about 74% of those would have been in network, 79 on the BSW plus HMO, which is the HSA plan network, and then on the PPO, 84%. So while there is provider disruption, the majority of claims and providers would be of would have been in network with Baylor Scott & White health plan. >> Sorry, can I
052interrupt on that real >> Yes. >> quick? Just to clarify that. So are you saying it is it the actual providers that are options for our employees or the actual ones they were using? >> ones they were using. So the ones they see every day, we took the actual claims, used Baylor Scott & White's data, and ran a cross comparison of the disruption that that would create. >> Thank you. >> That's a great question. >> Ross, can you just, like for people that don't do this all the time, >> Yeah. >> say that as plainly as possible. >> Yeah. >> So you took all the claims >> Mhm. And there's a lot of different types of providers, which makes disruption report extremely confusing. For example, emergency rooms, well that's typically not in anybody's network, right?
053But if you talk about a general practitioner, if I saw 100 GPs on that plan on the far right, 74.5% would would have been in network or the claims processed with those general practitioners. And so up to 84% of the actual claims filed with those providers. >> Yeah, the 74.5% is the lowest. >> It's a That's the That is the lowest cost option. >> expensive cost and 84.2 is the PPO that's the most expensive. >> That's right. And one thing that Baylor Scott & White is committed to is employee education at the open enrollment meetings and and explaining the differences between the various networks and the plans. Healthcare's confusing. I do say it often keeps me in a job, uh unfortunately or fortunately. Um but it is very confusing. And so it is important for
054employees when they go through and make these benefit choices, if access to care is your most important thing, in this example, you would want to choose the PPO option, for example. If you're an MD Anderson patient regularly, you'd want to choose that. I do want to point out there's a continuity of care provision with Baylor Scott & White, which means that if you're in your second or third trimester of pregnancy, you're a high-risk pregnancy, uh newly diagnosed with cancer, uh trauma, transplant candidate, um recent major surgery, acute conditions, hospital confinement, or behavioral health conditions, you have the ability to apply with the health plan and continue the coverage with the provider that you're currently seeing, whether they're in network or not. It doesn't mean that Baylor Scott & White will approve that, but it does
055mean it's an option for you to apply for continuity of care. Okay. Um the benchmark on TRS, I do just cuz we get this question a lot from trustees is what would it cost us in TRS versus us being on our own. And so, on the Baylor Scott & White plan options, as apples to apples as we can make it, it saves about 1.64 million in total premiums. Okay, so what are the actual premiums cost? This would be this year hypothetically um, versus uh, the prior year. So, if we focus on the 1500 plan first and on this grid is a little confusing, but I I'll go through the employee only. The cost last year on the 1500 HMO with Blue Cross was $83.65. That is going to go down to $80.43. On the 2500
056HMO, based on the district's contribution, last year that was $37.51 cents a check. That would go up $3 to $40.60 cents a check. On the 3400 HSA plan, that one was $29.92. Uh, last year it would go up to $67.89 cents this year. And the PPO option, $97 versus $147 for this next plan year. So, what would happen if we kept Blue Cross Blue Shield at the 27% increase? So, you can see here what the cost difference would be and this is comparing it to the Baylor Scott & White uh, proposal we got. So, for example, on the 1500 plan to cover an employee only, it would cost an employee $146 more a month. On the 2500, it would be $157 a month or 21% more. On the HSA option, $121 a month. And the
057PPO option, $87 a month. The cost difference between Baylor Scott & White's proposal and the 27% increase of Blue Cross Blue Shield, based on where employees are rolled today equates to about a $2.81 million difference in total overall annual spend. >> And that is based on next year's rate for Blue Cross Blue Shield cuz what you showed us earlier was Blue Cross Blue Shield for 25-26. >> Yeah. >> And we're looking at Baylor Scott & White for 26-27. >> That's correct. I wanted to show everyone what their cost difference would be if they chose the plan with Baylor Scott & White versus last year cuz the question we commonly get in an open enrollment meeting is what was I paying for health care last year versus what will it be this year. And then I
058think this grid's extremely helpful because it shows the cost to keep Blue Cross Blue Shield and how much it is. In a perfect world, I would love to stand up here and tell you Blue Cross Blue Shield went down and everybody's benefits are getting better. I would love nothing more for the teachers of this district for that to be the case. Um but unfortunately, we have to do the best with the data we have. We have to work and go out there and get the best options so that people can afford care and have good access to care as well as benefits when they utilize it. And Baylor Scott & White was by far the best option when we we looked at all those numbers. >> Uh if their providers are at Saint Joe, how
059does that factor >> That's a great question. So CHI is out of network ironically and Baylor Scott & White can answer this question. If I chose the PPO and drove to Houston, I might be able to use CHI there because I would have United Healthcare's network. But if I'm in in the county or a Baylor Scott & White service area on that PPO option, I cannot go see a CHI representative. Now, I will say this, that doesn't mean and this is one point about networks. So if I renew with Blue Cross for 9-1 and CHI gets in a fight with Blue Cross because they want to higher reimbursement for MRIs and CT scans and everything else under the sun. They can exit their network. We just saw that with Memorial Hermann in Houston with a
060massive fight with Blue Cross Blue Shield. So, this happens all the time. So, just because Baylor Scott & White doesn't have CHI today, it doesn't mean that next year or in the future they won't contract a network. That's also not a promise that they will. It's just to say that that could happen in the future. >> Do we have any data at all of how many of those on the continuity of care? >> Mhm. >> You know, it looks like 11,000 total claim at service encounters. Like, do you have any sense at all of how many of those were St. Joe's CHI? >> Well, my best guess would be the majority of the disruption is CHI St. Joe's. >> much where that 15 to 25% is coming from. >> Yeah, there's some private providers on
061the various networks that may or may not be in. >> all practical purposes >> Yeah, Texas Children's one we ran for example that's UPA. They're in all all three plan networks in network. I know that's a big one, especially with people with kids on the plan having a $0 pediatric copay that'll be a huge benefit on three of the four plan options. >> When you mentioned continuity of care, you said they have to apply for that. >> Mhm. >> So, if you're >> So, so a couple of things. They could go through the district's benefits HR team and contact us and we would help them with that. Of course, we're happy to help any employee with continuity care. Obviously, people are very stressed out in those type of situations. There's nothing like an expectant mother
062that's been with OB/GYN for a long time and going to deliver and the the kind of the anxiety around that. So, our team would help any of those continuity of care situations when we were notified or they could go direct to Baylor Scott & White Health Plan. Also, and seek that continuity care on their own if that's what they were comfortable with. >> Okay, so tell those expectant mothers to call you is what I heard you right. >> Hey, I promise I'm going to get some questions. It's it's inevitable. >> Do you have any idea and I don't know if you know the answer to this. Do you have any idea the success rate of that of what that would look like? >> So, I'm going to defer since they took the time to come
063to my Baylor Scott & White crew over there and ask them what the percentage or if they know of the continuity of care. >> Sorry. So, we do provide a form to all the employees and it has um it gives some very good examples of what would be approved. It's always a medical decision, so you know it has to go through our care team and be reviewed and approved based on medical necessity. But, it does give some very good examples on the form of what would be approved, so you have a good idea. >> I'm assuming this is something your team when y'all are doing the enrollment, y'all will sit down one-on-one with an employee and sit down and take the time to educate them on all of this. >> Absolutely. Yes. We will be
064there at meetings. >> Ross, you had four respondents to the RFP, right? >> That's correct. >> two were eliminated just cuz >> cost. >> Okay. >> Curative is a a newer health plan out of Austin, Texas. Um they have had some success in member growth. The thing they do is a zero dollar deductible plan for everything. I wish they were very competitive on the district cuz teachers would have loved to have that benefit, but the reality is they were way too expensive. And then EMI does a lot of school districts. They they even self-admittedly said we're just sending in a bid to send one, pretty much. >> Okay. >> Um so, they were they were high, but that's a great question. >> How how long are these numbers good? >> Yeah, they're good for September
0651st. Um so, at the renewal date, but obviously if we ran up against that wall, you'd have to renew with Blue Cross Blue Shield at the 27%. >> Okay. So, in theory the district had I I understand there would be some time required for transition, right? But, the district had does have time arguably to make a decision on this. >> Yeah, they absolutely I mean you could. The longer you wait of course, you know, with open enrollments there's 30-day process admission to carriers that takes time. But, yes. >> When would be our preferred timeline for enrollment? I I mean I I don't know if that's for you or for the district. >> I don't schedule this, but I believe the first enrollment meeting is scheduled for July 9th just to give you kind of a
066sense. And keep in mind that enrollment systems have to be updated plan documents, benefit guides, all those things. So, it is it is a process to get those things updated. >> The second year caps between 11 and 1/2 14.6%. What happens after 2 years? >> Yeah, the same thing that happened here. So, if you're running well with Baylor Scott & White, obviously they would give you a more preferred renewal in most situations. Not always, but in most. Um you know, or the RFP's conducted again. We go out to market and we find the best overall health plan provider. And we can also do that in the second year if there's dissatisfaction with Baylor Scott & White. But, there could be a caveat that if we do that we lose the rate cap guarantee from them.
067>> I want to go back to something you said at the very beginning just cuz you went you went through it quickly. One of the challenges if I understand what you said tonight in getting this bid was that when you add up all the premiums conversation as the employees paid last year >> Yep. >> Blue Cross Blue Shield paid 9% in health care coverage more than they received in premiums. >> That's correct. >> And since they're not running a non-profit business >> Correct. >> and they need to make money to be able to maintain a business that made us not very attractive to everybody you went out to, which I assume is part of why we got declined by >> That's correct. >> of the 17 companies that they said that we're not going to
068touch that. Is that right? >> Yeah, they look at a number of things on RFP. The last couple years of claims, they look at your large claimants and they have an actuary project how much those claimants will spend over the course of the next year. Another big one that's always in the news and it's a political football is prescription drugs. And so the cost of those, lots of specialty meds out there 5, 10, 15,000 a month. If you see a commercial on TV at night, I can guarantee you Google the drug, it's expensive. So that's kind of the challenges the healthcare industry faces is we have all these new to market treatments and care, but the reality is that it's very expensive. And so when you have certain aspects of those things on your plan,
069it can drive costs unexpectedly as well. >> You mentioned prescription, do they have to use Baylor Scott & White pharmacies? >> They don't. There's other pharmacies in that network that they have access to. That's a great question. >> So if we stick with Blue Cross Blue Shield the lowest amount anybody's paying more is 87 bucks a month. >> That's 87 on top of the current. That's correct. >> Okay. So in every single instance the rate goes up, the least it would go up is 87 bucks and for some people it goes up >> Well, it's actually more than that because that's versus the Baylor Scott & White premium. >> That's relative to the to the proposal. >> Correct. >> Okay. >> So it's even more. It's even more than the 86, 87. >> Got it.
070So the the pain for anybody is if they're CHI >> Yep. >> and then they would have to apply to stay um and if they have medical necessity is what you said, my concern would be that for better or worse, if Baylor Scott & White says we can provide that care, and I would just be concerned >> is possible, and the carrier has a discretion on that. Usually in sensitive situations though, on a new group, they're pretty favorable on granting that. Not always. >> Yeah. We it this has been a challenge in my five years or whatever I've been on the board of how many times we've had to do this. Um and I know it's hard for people. We had a handful of emails from staff. >> Sure. >> Uh reached out to people,
071and so I know that this is can be uncomfortable, can be a challenge, may have to change providers and all of those things. Um so it's not a decision that I think any of us are taking lightly, but also trying to Uh for historical context, we had TRS We uh years ago, we gave everybody a raise, and the next year TRS raised the premium to exactly how much the raise was that we gave everybody. >> Yep. >> Um so it's insurance companies are not always our friends and not always my favorite personally. Um so this is a challenge for everybody. Thank you for the information. >> Yeah. I I will say one more thing and and um I've had people ask me before, what do you do for your health care? And I do enroll
072through the health care through my employer, but my wife, who's also graduate of College Station ISD, is enrolled in Baylor Scott & White health plan. She's actually on a higher deductible than any of the district would offer. Um and it's very good coverage, and she has a pre-existing condition, and you know, we get great treatment. We go to retina specialist for it. So a lot of times people assume that someone presenting this is doing something for themselves and they would recommend, but you know, I'm comfortable. I'm in this industry, and and that's the plan my wife has. >> Yeah, I do want to ask, just to be clear on this, if the there was someone else that was managing the Blue Cross Blue Shield, a different broker. >> That's correct. >> But Anco doesn't serve
073the benefit any differently regardless of which one the board chooses, correct? >> That's right. >> not if we choose Baylor Scott & White, you get paid, and if we choose Blue Cross Blue Shield, the other guy gets paid. >> No, we do our best to attempt to do this for free, believe it or not. >> But, you would manage either plan, so there's really no benefit to Anco other than you have no you have no dog in the fight. >> It's a lot easier for an insurance agent to renew things than change things. >> just want to make sure that was clear. >> Yeah. Along Sorry, just along those lines, a question was asked, um is there a would there be a possibility to keep two plans? Cuz some of the feedback we got is
074people would be maybe pay more to keep existing >> It's a common question, and you would think an employer with roughly 1,500 people enrolled would have the ability to do that, but in these bids, the carrier assumes a certain participation rate, and so if you cut into that, both carriers are going to assume the worst, and they're going to assume adverse risk, and they're going to all raise their rates up to where it's not affordable in either option. So, I hate to say it's kind of an all or none in these situations. In pools with thousands and thousands of people, sometimes you'll see multiple health plans offered, especially in regions, um but today it's more common that there's a single health plan offered, and Baylor Scott & White works around that by having something like
075their PPO option, which includes the ability to go anywhere you want to go with United Healthcare outside their service area. And that's kind of how they work around that. It was a problem for years, and they addressed it as a health plan. >> Also want to point out and appreciate how much the district contributes. I don't know if you know averages from other districts, but I know a lot of districts do not contribute nearly this much. We're that we are contributing thousands of dollars per employee. >> Absolutely. We work on many districts. Hub, who anchors a part of, works on many school districts and the district does contribute a whole lot of money for teacher health care and more than a lot of districts do. That's for sure. >> it's well beyond what's required by
076the state. That's absolutely a positive. Um So, Dr. Payne alluded to some of the emails and the questions that we received um a lot yesterday and today. I think once people became aware of the agenda and that we would be taking this up for consideration this evening. So, also want to thank you because I think your presentation and your information answered a lot of those questions. What is And I wish we would have had this information to the to to our faculty and staff in a more timely manner as opposed to the same night that we're being asked to consider it. >> Sure. >> But again, the economics of the recommendation makes sense. Um to me. I just um I wish in the time management or the presentation of or whatever, it would have been
077more friendly for our employees so that there wasn't this state of uh elevated concern that we experienced the last day or two. Um >> I definitely appreciate renewals are tough and when they received and kind of the timelines, what I can tell you is as a the new representative on the plan, our team will do our best to have this be an even earlier process next year if possible so that there's more transparency for everyone involved. Um we kind of hit the ground running as fast as we could. It takes carriers, you know, 45 to 60 days typically to respond, turn around and answer questions. So, it was a pretty tight timeline, but we'll do our best to to meet and exceed standards in the future. >> Yeah, you know, I think that the the
078numbers are the numbers. I mean, you can't that's thousands of dollars per employee per year. Like it's you are you know, you know, health care is so challenging compared to home insurance or auto insurance because it's it's people. You're talking about I don't feel very emotional about my cars. I feel emotional about my children having the care that they need if something happens to them. And so I think and I think we've seen that in the in the last day or two. It's to me it's been clear that this is there is a lot of emotion and a lot of strong feelings around this. Mathematically, this feels very straightforward to me. I mean, I think the way I think about it is if you could receive 80% of the options for something at 70% of
079the cost, generally that's a deal I would I would take knowing that there are people with real situations that are going to be disrupted, that this is very inconvenient for them, understandably. I think the biggest thing that I feel disappointed in the process is not about the numbers. I think it's we've talked for months about hoping that these are expecting, not hoping, expecting that the numbers would go down, and so I think we sort of set ourselves up for a little bit of disappointment in that they did go down in what they would have been, but the the real dollar cost per employee is going up. And so I think that probably if if we hadn't said that, then people wouldn't have grabbed on to that, but we did say that at multiple times. And
080then too, I I would love on I think on this What's that? Okay. I think on any decision like that I'm reminded in the last few days. I think we have a real obligation as a board and administration to anytime we can bring people along with us in decisions that are personal. I think we have to make a commitment to doing that and it wouldn't have been I don't think Ross I don't think it would have been saying this is exactly the cost, this is exactly what's happening. But even a committee, a panel, a survey asking would you pay X more for your health coverage if it meant that it you didn't have to change continuity like I'm hesitant because I can say what Chris Field would do. But I don't have children with any
081special medical needs and for 20 years of my life I didn't even have health insurance I or a plan a group plan I just used whatever I could use cuz I was always in entrepreneurial jobs. And so the way I would make this decision is really unique to my experience and I'm even I feel hesitant to speak on behalf of 1400 employees when in the last 24 hours I've had more emails than on any other topic since I've been on the board in 7 months. Is Did we only hear from the people who were upset? Maybe that's it. But I don't know because the people we heard from pulled a memo out of an agenda posted online and got it got that information to us. And so I think if I have any disappointment has
082nothing to do with Ross. I love Baylor Scott & White title sponsor of the BCS Marathon. My mom worked at Baylor Scott & White for many many at Scott & White for many many years in the days when it was $5 co-pays. Um, so I it's nothing to do with that. I think we could have managed the communication in this process better, and I think our stakeholders deserve that in the future, and I hope we can learn from that regardless of how we vote on this. >> I do want to, um, address that a little bit just to just to kind of be clear on the timeline because, um, my understanding was the district received the information, you know, that we're looking at last Monday. Is that correct? Um, so it it just just to
083be clear, we haven't had a situation where the district's been holding onto information for a long time, um, that they could have communicated. And so it is a tight time frame. Um, I mean, we as a board first got our first look at this on Friday last week. So, um, we knew that Blue Cross Blue Shield was going up 27.whatever percent last Friday. Um, it's a quick time frame to look at it, and I do understand the concerns of, you know, employees who have contacted us. Everybody really wants to be sure that they get the care that they need, that they get it for their kids. Um, we understand all of that. I feel like, um, as a board member, I have to rely on the expertise of the people who are doing this every
084day. So, the fact that we're going to get presentation that says, "Hey, you know, here's everything we've looked at. Here's the experience that we have." Because I can't speak for every employee and every specific need. And the reality is, um, it's hard to change, and there's probably going to be a few people in this process that it is going to be painful because there may be some very special circumstances that don't fall under one of the perfect, you know, examples that we have. Um, but unfortunately group insurance is is something you have to kind of look at in the aggregate. And so I think looking at the numbers that we have on the cost savings, going with Baylor Scott & White, and, you know, falling back on the expertise of those who do this every
085day, I have to consider that more as a trustee than, you know, getting into the weeds of the feelings that we all have about a change. I wish that as a trustee I could say, "Yes, keep your plan that you love, and it's going to be $100 less." But, that's not the situation that we have, and neither the district um or the Board of Trustees have any control over what medical insurance is doing. So, you know, I I understand that there's a lot of concerns. They're valid, those feelings are valid, but we also have to um have to come to a decision, and we have to give the district time to adjust it to whatever decision we make, as well. Um so, those were the few things that I was going to add. >> Historically,
086I haven't been here as long as some of you sitting on the board, but is this not similar timelines to years previous when we get presented with the information of insurance for our employees? >> what I I mean, we've been in this situation every 2 years, really. It's so this is not new for employees um that we've had to deal with this, and then it sometimes it is a tight timeline, and sometimes we have more time um to vote, but I think as Mr. Martindale said, this spells out the economics of it. Um and I had a lot of questions coming in, and really I mean, it was posted I think Wednesday, or whatever where Austin is. So, um that it was coming up. Um so, uh as I I came in with questions, I
087got a handful of emails. I've had way more emails about other subjects before, cuz I think employees who've been here have just been through this before, and and I have I have think we all have the same concerns, to your point, Ms. Segi. Um you know, we're pushing this out as soon as we can um for all those reasons. I motion to approve as presented. >> So, I I want to clarify my comments earlier. I was not >> Just a point of order, we have a motion to approve. I have to ask, do we have a second? Okay, that motion is going to fail for the time being. Go ahead. >> Mr. Arnold. My comments were not directed at Ross. So, if they were taken as such, I apologize. >> No, they weren't at all.
088>> Where where I the point of my comments were I district got this on Monday. Sure. I did not see this on Friday, Ms. EEE. Well, it was in transmittal with with a comparison of the rate cost. We got this presentation as a Board of Trustees at 11:00 today. Is that correct statement? >> The entire presentation. My my comment was that last Friday, we knew that Blue Cross Blue Shield was increasing and that the district was bringing forward a Baylor Scott & White. We we received that information and we had Friday. I think we had the chart that showed the increase for every plan on Friday. >> Who drafted that right? >> clear, that was the information that we received on >> I just think if if if some of this would have even been
089attached to the agenda for people to see, it'd provide some clarification. People it was was my point. I understand the tight timeline on everything else, but I think the more information we can get out in advance, it answers some of the questions or it eliminates the questions altogether. That that was my point. Now, in addition to this, so the timeline that we are dealing with, in theory, what's good to a September 1, but I know that's not practical nor reasonable. To begin the enrollment period, I think I heard Ross say it's supposed to end for July 9th. >> July 9th, that's right. That's the first meeting. >> So, and and the board may not have an appetite for this, and I'm not sure it changes the end result. Actually, I feel like probably a majority
090of our employees, because the economics absolutely speak to it. Does it serve us any Does it serve us to sit on this a week, allow for a feedback? Didn't Maybe this presentation answered the questions that we received. Maybe it didn't. Maybe we get no additional feedback or anything else, but it does it allow our employees not to process the information just as we've been able to before we take action. Now, I know that requires an everybody coordinating their calendar if they even want to consider this as an option. It likely probably won't change the outcome, because again, I think the dollars are going to drive this even for our individuals, but at least it shows that we're providing our stakeholders with an opportunity to to know what's going on as opposed to here's the presentation
091the board has taken action. At the This is I guess I'm I'm throwing this out there to see We just had a motion, which failed. So, I I we need to have some conversation then. >> I agree to that extent, but I don't understand what getting their feedback. I mean, he just said it takes 45 to 60 days. Like, if we wanted to put this back out for proposal, we don't have the time. It sounded like only four people even gave us an RFP. Um I agree. I I wish people would have had more time to process, because I do think Ross's presentation answers a lot of the questions in the emails, especially the network retention slide that shows most of these folks aren't going to lose the care, and that was one of the
092big questions is am I going to still be able to use my doctor? They didn't want 90-day waiting periods, but um I I I think it just it I don't think it would change the outcome to delay it to have people just say they're not happy. I mean, some people may say, "Okay, I'm good." But, I just don't understand what the point would be other than I And I don't want to discount people reaching out to us, and I tried to email back everybody except for the last few I couldn't get to today. Um and I And I do want people to understand that I sympathize. Yeah, this isn't what we kind of thought was going to happen. I don't like that they're going to have to change doctors. I mean, we had a situation
093my son had a major surgery, and we were with Memorial Hermann, and they dropped us right after his surgery, and we had to apply for continuity of care. So, I I've been in that situation. Um I just don't know I don't really know what would buy us pushing it off a week to get additional feedback. Um I would welcome people. I'm sure we're still going to hear when people are upset, whatever we outcome is tonight. Um but, I think in the essence of time, we have to do something to start meeting these enrollment deadlines. >> And without a process to to collect, you know, everybody's feedback, then we're just getting anecdotal feedback anyway. Um not that people's stories don't matter, but I would be concerned with um we don't we just the time frame I
094know that's coming up between now and July 9th. I would be concerned with how we could effectively get good feedback and and be able to address it anyway when we know the options aren't going to change. The options are going to be what they are, no matter whether we like them or um So, I think we're good. >> to have the choice, which is why I was asking those questions. At the same time, if you look at who's investing in our community, uh you can just see the growth on Highway 6 of what Baylor Scott & White is doing to provide here and the and the more access that they have. So, to me, that's a benefit. I hope we're not right back here in 2 years doing this again, but it's a reality of
095where we've been repeatedly over and over again. So, to your point, I don't know what's going to change Um and we are asked to make tough decisions and that's what we have to do. >> It it I get that. I understand where in that sense we'd be kicking the can down the road. I hope this serves as an example for us with future items that maybe we can discuss things a little bit more in advance. So that our our folks [snorts] like the emails we received don't feel like such decisions are are rushed. I think that would help tremendously in um letting our employees know that we too struggle with these things and we want to make the best decisions possible for them and we need to have these conversations to show them as such.
096Uh so uh I I just I feel like this is an example that we need to be mindful of in the future. >> I 100% agree and to go back to your kind of question is this a normal time frame schedule? Yes, this is the normal time we would have to address it um but I think the thing that was seemed a little different to me is that I even for me as a board member, I was surprised that that was going to be the significant change that it was that we didn't really have much of a at least I didn't have any heads up that this was coming. So I can I can understand how our our staff who even had got a little bit less information than we did what you know, were
097reacting and and nervous and so I do think there was an opportunity certainly for um even without all the information, you know, you've talked about that with us that that at least have some of the conversation that you know, why we're going out for bids because of you know where what Baylor Scott and White's uh our Blue Cross Blue Shield was coming back with. So, I I really think that would have been so much more helpful for not only for our staff and teachers and and their understanding of what's happening, but for us as well as we as we move forward cuz the feedback and that they provide for us is always helpful as well. Um all that said, I agree that the presentation really did answer the questions that I think most people um
098had that I had and it is not you know, it's it's the the worst of two evils, right? In this situation. We don't have like a everything's perfect option, but the the numbers, the monthly savings up there, the monthly difference um with comparing the two plans make the make the number side of it pretty clear and I'm not sure if waiting any longer would really make a difference at this point. Gotta help people with the transition. >> So, acknowledging that we know that we've had a tight time frame to turn this around. Um and also acknowledging the information that we've been presented tonight. Um do I have a motion on this item? >> Motion to approve as presented. >> I second. >> I have a motion to approve the employee health care insurance for 2016-2017
099by Dr. Payne. I have a second by Ms. Wilson. Is there any other comments? >> Just that I wish we could offer better to our employees and then you know, and I know you do too. Thank you for making the effort. Um it's just this is these are the options we've got, right? >> I think we will. All in favor, please say I. I. Any opposed? That motion has passed six to one. Thank you all for that. Um and I believe and thank you for your presentation. I really appreciate that. >> Thanks. >> Say that again? >> It was 7-0. >> I am so sorry. Let me go back and make sure that I record that correctly. I saw a hand then I mistakenly um interpreted that. So, I'm going to do that again. All
100in favor, please say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? >> 7-0. >> Thank you for correcting me on that. Um all right, that is going to move us to our executive session. The board will meet in executive session to discuss safety and security updates. The session will be held pursuant to the discussion regarding intruder detection audit and corrective action plan exception in the open meetings act as set forth in section 551.076 of the Texas Government Code. We are going into closed session at 8:21. All right, it is 8:31. We're returning to open session and if there's no dissent, we will adjourn. >> No, Kristen, did you need to do >> Mhm.