FONDA - Montgomery County's health-care trust is one step closer to being eliminated.
The Finance Committee of the county Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to forward two resolutions to the full board. One would dissolve the trust, and the other would nullify contracts already signed between the officers of the buying consortium called the Montgomery County Health Insurance Trust Plan. The full board will consider both measures at its meeting next week.
The consortium was established in 2007 when the Board of Supervisors voted to create a trust under Article 47 of state insurance law. Montgomery County was unable to form an Article 47 trust, and supervisors defeated a resolution in August 2011 that would have converted the trust from an Article 47 to an Article 44.
Article 47 allows municipalities to share the costs of self-insuring their employees with other municipalities, school districts or similar groups. It requires a minimum number of employees to participate, and Montgomery County was unable to meet that minimum. Article 44 does not require a minimum number of employees.
The resolution forming the consortium named Amsterdam Town Supervisor Thomas DiMezza as its chairman. DiMezza proposed another resolution Tuesday that would have dissolved the trust but forced the county to honor contracts already signed, but it was defeated.
The confusion over whether a trust does or does not exist is part of the reason supervisors want to start the process over again.
"Everybody knows there isn't a trust," Minden Town Supervisor Thomas Quackenbush said Tuesday.
Quackenbush said he met with Thomas DiMezza to discuss dissolving the trust.
"I asked Supervisor DiMezza, 'Can't we dissolve this and put it back in the county's hands?'" Quackenbush said. "We met with [Montgomery County Attorney] Doug Landon to discuss how we could formulate a resolution. I wasn't totally happy and he wasn't totally happy."
Quackenbush said he wanted the resolutions to come before a special meeting of the full Board of Supervisors.
"I didn't ask for it to come before the Finance Committee," Quackenbush said. "This issue needs to be talked about on its own. I'm going to vote to move all the resolutions to the full board."
DiMezza supported the idea of sending the resolutions to the full board.
"Dissolving the trust, if done correctly, should be no problem," he said.
John R. Becker covers Montgomery County news. He can be reached at montco@leaderherald.com