Monday, August 28, 2006
Kansas Medicaid financing update
[Dave Ranney, "Firm’s Medicaid advice may backfire for state," The Lawrence Journal-World, 28 August 2006.]
The Lawrence Journal-World's Dave Ranney peels another layer back in the ongoing Medicaid financing mess in his latest column on the subject:
Ten years ago, state welfare officials fell head-over-heels in love with Maximus, a Virginia-based consulting firm that knew how to coax millions of federal dollars out of the nation’s Medicaid program.
The company’s experts helped the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services take in an additional $26 million in 1996 alone. Millions more soon followed.
Maximus, it seemed, could do no wrong.
Now, Medicaid wants — and is taking back — a lot of its money that it gave Kansas.
SRS isn’t happy. Earlier this month, SRS Secretary Gary Daniels announced the department had dropped its “maximization” contract with Maximus.
“It seems they’ve become somewhat of a lightning rod for (auditors),” Daniels said. “We decided it would be best if we managed our own affairs.”
A recent report by the National Academy for State Health Policy noted “the federal government has allowed and even encouraged state fiscal practices that it later determines are problematic.”
But the report also surmised that states “are engaged in a constant game of ‘catch me if you can’ in an effort to maximize receipt of federal funds.”
Tom Lenz, regional administrator at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ office in Kansas City, Mo., said he understood the state’s frustration.
“It’s true, (federal) guidance wasn’t always crystal clear,” Lenz said.
But, he said, states shouldn’t expect the federal government to ignore past transgressions.
“When the current administration came in, it decided we needed to enhance the oversight of Medicaid program and strengthen policies as to what’s allowable and appropriate,” he said. “That’s what we’re doing.”
[Matthew Hisrich, "Shutting down Medicaid shell games," The Kansas City Kansan, 26 July 2006.]
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