JBC-Employee Benefits Division - Oversight Subcommittee
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All right, folks, we are going to begin. See if my co-chair, do you have any comments? I have no
Speaker 6
7:42
comments today. I'm just excited for a lengthy
discussion. Thank you. Mr. Wallace, if you'd come to the table, please. Members, we're just going to take these three issues one at a time. Mr. Wallace will explain them one at a time, and we'll take questions and review.
So, Mr. Wallace, if you'd like to present on number one, you're welcome to introduce yourself, and
Chair
Unverified
8:13
you're welcome to begin. Grant Wallace, Director of the Employee Benefits Division, and thank you, members, for being here early in what I know is an extremely busy week for you all. So, the first item on the agenda is the pharmacy formulary for March 2025. exhibit C1. What you'll see on here is pretty much a normal review and movement of some of
the medications. Things that I do want to highlight are down at the bottom of the page, starting with Yazintic and the next three. Those are the biosimilars for Stellara that we are rolling on to our formulary. So these would go into effect 6-1-ish, if not a little bit sooner, but Stelara, which is the name brand, will be rolling off of our formulary 7-1, again trying
to favor the lower cost biosimilars. You'll see in the middle of the page we're doing a reclassification of the HIV drug class and with that to be glad to answer any questions members anyone
have any questions seeing no questions we will see this item without objection reviewed and approved
Chair
Unverified
9:43
let's go to number two all
All right. Number two is the medical drug recommendations. And again, these are the drugs that are administered in a clinical setting. You'll see the first four are, again, the biosimilar to Stelara. When you look at the Stelara, they start on the medical side with an IV infusion and then switch over to the pharmacy. So we want to make sure that we have both of those covered on both sides um outside of that everything else is just a review or an
exclusion of new to market drugs i'd be glad to
answer any questions members anyone have questions say no questions this item is without objection reviewed
Chair
Unverified
10:33
and approved number three all right number three is a new contract for your review this is for the student loan forgiveness provider program so back in the um h the w bush presidency he signed into law the public service loan
forgiveness program which essentially allows an individual who has a student loan if they were to go to work in the government space or nonprofit space and make 120 continuous payments during their service, those at the end of that, the remaining balance of that loan would be forgiven. I do want to highlight two important things. This is not erasing of student debt. These are individuals who have been working and making regular contributions and payments on their loan
for 120 months. What this program does and what we're looking to do here is bring an advisor to work with our state employees to help them navigate this public service loan forgiveness program. It is something that's very complicated. I will personally attest to the complexity of it because I thought I was doing the right thing. I thought I was making the right financial decisions for me and I completely messed up my ability to participate in this program so having said that
the the contract before you is for an initial term of three years the one year payment is $304,000 so that initial three-year cost is $917,000 the total seven year if we go that far is 2.1 million i know there's a lot of press around this program as well with the current administration they are here to help navigate those changes that the administration makes
but if for some reason through an act of congress if this were to go away this contract would also end at that time period so with that i'd
be glad to answer any questions so just make sure i heard you right so if the if the at the u.s level if this money is stopped or withdrawn or the contract is impacted then this contract ends correct okay members any questions senator you're recognized
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
13:04
thank you mr chair how many of these individuals typically seek the assistance to get
Chair
Unverified
13:10
this program enacted so um forgive me i don't have the exact quote but i want to say it's something around um like 10 actually make it all the way through um and there is just a lot of nuances and employee verification that you have to do they're going to assist us as the state and working with opm to make sure that those verifications are done and just make sure that the employee knows all the little hoops that they need to jump through and help them navigate that.
Out of all employees? Out of all state employees? I'm just trying to... Right. So the eligible number, I think, is
Senator Scott Flippo
Unverified
13:51
around 6,000 is what we were basing this off of that would
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
13:56
be able to participate in this. So out of
Chair
Unverified
13:59
6,600 roughly? Currently would be ones that would actually get the full final approval. We're hoping to improve that with this program. Okay. All right. Thank you. if this contract is not approved what happens we just keep going on and they still continue to challenge and fight and navigate this one of the reasons
that I through EBD and picking this up is because of the mental health and well-being of our employees the financial stress that this is putting on our employees we want to help them navigate that and hopefully offer a little incentive to continue to stay into government work and continue to retain those employees Senator Bryant you're recognized thank you mr. chair
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
14:47
and just to follow just to follow that dialogue do you
know what what we're currently funded at what like what the program is funded at by I assume Congress sets out an allocation in their budget I do not have that information it do you know if it's allocated by percentage of employees
Chair
Unverified
15:07
per state or no because i think it's it's an individual
Senator Scott Flippo
Unverified
15:10
um participation so i don't think there's any sort of like block that only x number out of arkansas versus x number out of mississippi it's it's not contrived that way it really is on the individual level and your individual ability
to meet all the criteria in order to get that remaining balance forgiven and so currently if I'm
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
15:29
in that situation I am pursuing that of my own volition right through the federal government to try to meet those hurdles right and what you're offering is the
state pick up the tab for navigating those hurdles well we are picking up the tab
Senator Scott Flippo
Unverified
15:43
for an advisor to come alongside them and help them navigate it and help them get that approval at the end of the day okay is it one
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
15:54
company with 10 advisors or is it one advisor
Senator Scott Flippo
Unverified
15:57
it's one company with multiple advisors so they would be doing on-site visits they're going to go into our agencies and do general kind of town hall meetings they're going to set up one-on-one sessions with our employees and then they're also going to have virtual options after that is that not
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
16:14
something that our audit division can do or at the state auditors level that handles all our payroll and insurance needs can they not set up an internal program like I know VSOs do that for navigating
Veterans Affairs is that not something that the state has the
Speaker 12
16:31
ability to I think the expertise that this particular firm has would be better
Chair
Unverified
16:36
suited than trying to hire additional state employees to do this work okay
thank you members we have any other questions there seems to be some concern on this one so I'll look for does anyone have a motion to approve number three
Agenda
No agenda available.
Documents
| Title | Type | Pages | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agenda — JBC-EMPLOYEE BENEFITS DIVISION- OVERSIGHT SUBCOMMITTEE, Apr 8, 2025 | Agenda | 1 | Official source ↗ |
| Exhibit C1- MArch 2025 Pharmacy Formulary Recom | Exhibit | 1 | Official source ↗ |
| Exhibit C2- March 2025 Drug Formulary Recommendations | Exhibit | 1 | Official source ↗ |
| Exhibt C3-EBD with APTUS | Exhibit | 1 | Official source ↗ |
Speakers
Speaker 2
Senator Dan Sullivan Chair
Unverified
Speaker 6
Chair
Unverified
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
Senator Scott Flippo
Unverified
Speaker 12