The Vermont Health CO-OP is overhauling its board in a quest to persuade Susan Donegan, commissioner of the Department of Financial Regulation, to reconsider the proposed member-owned cooperative’s application to operate as a licensed health insurer in Vermont.
Gone from the equation is Mitch Fleischer, one of the CO-OP’s founders and the former president of its board. One of the issues the department flagged in the CO-OP’s unsuccessful application was Fleischer’s “surprisingly high salary” of $120,000 a year — more than four times that of Blue Cross Blue Shield of Vermont’s chair.
The CO-OP’s CEO, Christine Oliver, said Fleischer resigned last week “to eliminate any distractions his participation may have caused.”
The five new board members are:
• M. Jerome Diamond, former attorney general of Vermont and founder of the Montpelier-based firm Diamond and Robinson. Diamond is close with Gov. Peter Shumlin and is representing the governor in negotiations over a controversial land deal with Shumlin’s neighbor.
• Steve Post, the president and CEO of the Vermont State Employees Credit Union, which is the state’s second largest credit union.
• David Kibbe, vice president of Universal Health Services, a hospital management company.
• Leonard Crouse, a former deputy commissioner at the Department of Financial Regulation, when it was the Department of Banking, Insurance, Securities and Health Care Administration.
• Chuck Butler, a native Vermonter and former executive for Blue Cross Blue Shield of Vermont and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Montana.
The new board members met for the first time Tuesday, and Oliver said she is looking for more board members to strengthen the CO-OP.
“Commissioner Donegan has articulated her concerns and we intend to address every one of them completely,” Oliver said in a public statement. “These additions to our leadership are part of that process and, taken together with our other actions, will make us a fundamentally stronger organization.”
Donegan said that the CO-OP has two options: reapply or file an appeal with the Vermont Supreme Court. But Oliver is pushing for the reconsideration of the CO-OP’s application, and she said the CO-OP is doing everything within its power to meet Donegan’s requests.
“At the end of the day, we expect to deliver to the commissioner exactly what she is looking for: a stronger health insurance company prepared to succeed financially in its mission to provide Vermonters a more personal alternative to traditional health insurance,” Oliver said. “We’re more dedicated than ever to delivering this option to Vermonters.”
The CO-OP has on hand $6 million in federal startup loans, and $27.4 million in promised solvency loans that would be made available if the insurer hit certain benchmarks.
