Hill County Commission Reverses Course on Agency Handling Insurance Policies Despite Recommendation from Insurance Committee – Hi-Line Today - Hi-Line Today

HAVRE, Mont. (NMB) – The Hill County Commission convened on Thursday morning for their weekly business meeting and voted unanimously to continue using Koefod Agency for managing their Workers Compensation and Property Casualty Insurance policies

Two weeks ago, the Commission voted to use PayneWest as the agency for Workers Compensation Insurance and Property Insurance. The transcript of that meeting is located at the end of this story.

On Thursday, the Commission said they only approved using PayneWest for Worker’s Comp, and accused local media of getting the details wrong.

The Commission never made a motion to rescind the motion made two weeks ago, and say they never sent letters to Koefod or PayneWest after making the original motion to inform them of their decision.

Commissioner Mark Peterson said they changed their mind after doing more research, and realized they never gave Koefod an opportunity to present to the County’s Insurance Committee. The Committee made the recommendation to the Commission to use PayneWest.

“Because of that, I’ve had second feelings about it, and so I’m going to make a motion that we continue with property casualty and trust and work comp with Koefod Insurance,” Peterson said Thursday.

“After reviewing it, we didn’t give Koefod the opportunity, as our current provider, to present their side to the Insurance Committee meetings. And that’s something we should have done,” said Commissioner Jake Strissel, the only Commissioner on the Insurance Committee.

“But what side did they have to present?,” said Clerk and Recorder Sue Armstrong, who is also on the Committee. “Because we know what they have been doing and PayneWest came in and showed us that they could close out all this stuff and save us money … I guess I’m concerned because we already published that we were going to do it.”

The Commission said they were told by the Montana State Fund that PayneWest would be unable to look into and close active claims, despite what PayneWest told the Committee. Peterson said they didn’t get back to PayneWest to see if there was a misunderstanding.

“Evidently, we did misunderstand, and I’ll give them that,” said Peterson. “It was a misunderstanding. But that was part of the reason we thought we were going to go with them. And after we got started talking to work comp, we found out no, that is not even an option.”

Ethan Heverly, Director of Government and Community Relations at the Montana State Fund, says he believes the claim from the Commission has some merit. He told New Media Broadcasters by phone on Thursday that PayneWest would not be able to look into active legacy claims prior to 2019, as that is when Hill County’s Worker’s Compensation provider changed from MACo (Montana Association of Counties) to the Montana State Fund when MACo stopped doing Worker’s Comp. The exception would be if they engaged in a Loss Portfolio Transfer, which would carry significant risk. However, for active claims since 2019, Heverly says that PayneWest would be able to work on closing them.

Requests for comment to PayneWest and Koefod were not immediately responded to.

Sheri Williams, the Executive Secretary for the Commissioners, is the County’s designated Safety Coordinator and a member of the Insurance Committee. She says she’s been working for months to get a safety program together with PayneWest. That led to the following tense exchange:

Williams: There also was another component to PayneWest as to why the Insurance Committee approved that was to set up one (of PayneWest’s) employees come in and set up a safety program for our county. For our county to get our safety program up and going, so our employees can have orientation…

Peterson: Is that not what we’ve been doing?

Williams: …on their safety that they are not getting at this time, nor have been for several years. Does Koefod provide that same service?

Commissioner Diane McLean: I would defend the fact that Koefod has been very involved attending their WorkSafe Champions, attending our Safety Committee Champions…

Williams: But that is not setting up a program.

McLean: Excuse me, Sherri.

Williams: That is totally different.

McLean: Excuse me Sherri. Excuse me Sherri.

Williams: That is not the same, Diane. (Koefod Operations Manager Kim Wirtzberger) has been a great cheerleader for us. I commend her. But having a program set up and being at our meetings and supporting us are two totally separate things.

McLean: We approved an employee safety manual in 2019. Our employee safety manual has our policy and how this will work. What are employee safety manual does not have is a person in our county who is our safety coordinator. We do not have that designated. That was our personnel clerk at one time. It became our HR person at one time. It was pulled out of our HR position when that changed and it is not going to be any insurance agent that’s going to come here and do the trainings. The same trainings are available to Hill County through Montana State Fund with Koefod as our agent as are available to Hill County through PayneWest. Yes, they are promising us they are going to work on these claims and get them closed. We find out in our conversation that in fact, agents are not able to advocate to close claims. That is between the physician and the return-to-work policies in your county. That is not something your agent gets involved in. The fact of the matter is we have accident forms, we have reporting forms, investigation checklists, safety inspection checklists, inspected area time frames, self inspection guidelines, etcetera etcetera. And the problem is not our insurance company. The problem is that Hill County is not following our policy.

Williams: We have no program set up at this time to follow. What program do we have set up for safety orientation for any of our employees?

Peterson: I think it is time we take a vote on this and we will hold further discussion in private. Because this is not something that needs to be aired to the public…

Williams: Because questions are not being answered.

Peterson: Sherri. You’re overstepping your bounds as a secretary.

Armstrong: She’s not.

Williams: I’m the safety coordinator, also. And I’ve asked specific pointed questions that refuse to be answered.

Armstrong: She does have the right to speak.

Williams: That is a totally different hat. I’m asking what programs do we have in place at this time, as a county, for our employees, for orientation of safety?

Armstrong: I think she’s asking for the one that Christine Muller was training us all on. Do you know what I’m talking about?

McLean: Yeah. It went by the wayside when the County Attorney did not allow the current personnel clerk to continue in that role…

Armstrong: So at this time, there is no (program).

McLean: …And the county did not reappoint someone to take her, and I don’t know about reappoint, but redistribute that duty to another employee. And it definitely needs to be an employee who is handling this stuff. It is not the fault of the insurance company and it is not the fault of the Safety Committee.

Williams: But the intentions of the Committee, when they recommended PayneWest, was for them to come in to help set up a program, a safety program…

McLean: It sure was.

Williams: With the materials that they could provide. My question was, does Koefod have the capability of doing that, and can they?

McLean: I guess that’s a question you’re going to have to ask Koefod. I’m going to ask for all in favor of said motion, state by saying ‘aye’

*all three Commissioners vote aye*

Peterson: Now, was there ever a written letter from the Insurance Committee stating their recommendation?

McLean: Well to me, yes. After the motion was made, way after the fact, January 24th.

Williams: That’s not true, either. Jake was supposed to give it to you, it did not get given to you. The motion was taken. I found out later when I asked again that that was not ever passed onto you. You asked for a letter, so I typed one stating that the motion had already been taken. Can we read the letter out loud so people would know? It’s public record. So that had fallen through the cracks also. The intention was, and there should have been follow through immediately, (regarding) that also.

McLean: Just like the Grazing Committee or the Rules and (Regulations) Committee to the Beaver Creek Park needs to recognize they are a committee, they make recommendations to the Board. But this Board right here makes the decision where we’re going to spend our county dollars. Was ever in any of the information gathered, were we ever apprised of the kind of affect that was going to have on a local business, a taxpayer in our area? We were not. And they were not allowed to bring that piece in. That is a huge, tremendous piece. And I have a lot of trouble sending those dollars aside somewhere when I have taxpayers down the street.

Williams: I could argue the same thing when we approved our life insurance agent (New York Life), that is outside our community, for our life insurance through the county. At that time nobody else was asked locally, for that opportunity (to provide) their information about life insurance…But it was voted on by this Commission, for that life insurance agent outside of Havre to be approved for this county as our agent. So that can be argued, also.

McLean argued that the life insurance situation was different because it was an opt-in system.

The Commission declined to read the letter out loud, but Williams provided New Media Broadcasters with the copy of a letter provided to the Commission from the Insurance Committee. The letter is dated January 24th. It states:

Dear Commissioners,

This letter is being submitted to you, on this date, upon request from Commissioner McLean and after a motion was taken on January 13, 2022 in that the county approved moving forward with PayneWest Insurance for Workman’s Compensation portion and not with the property and casualty side of the insurance. The motion passed 2-0.

It is hereby the recommendation, by the Hill County Insurance Committee, to the Hill County Commissioners that PayneWest Insurance be hired, by the county for the purpose of building a safety program in which the county can successfully move forward with all county employees, and also in the review of insurance claims that relate to the safety practices and of any open claims that could possibly be closed in the hopes of reducing the counties high mod rates that we now have at this current time.

The Committee also recommends that the hire of PayneWest Insurance be made as soon as possible, since time is of the essence when the county is looking to make a financial difference with not only accident insurance claims, which reflect our insurance claim mod rates, but to also insure a swift start at building a solid safety orientation program for the county.

Thank you for your time and consideration in this decision.

Sincerely,

Hill County Insurance Committee

Williams says that Hill County has the second highest MOD rate of any county in the state, and that the effort she helped with was hopefully going to lower that burden on the county.

Heverly said they are not able to publicly release MOD information.

Williams says along with PayneWest meeting with the Insurance Committee, the Hill County Commission had two separate meetings with PayneWest, and she is disheartened that they changed their mind.

“Since 2019, we have not had a safety program up and going until I stepped up and volunteered to be safety coordinator. Mind you, I am not getting paid for this position. I’ve gotten no compensation, even though I’ve asked. I’m doing a full-time safety coordinator position above and beyond my duties as an Executive Secretary for no compensation. I’ve gotten the WorkSafe Champions program up and going to help with the county to ultimately, down the line, save our county and the taxpayers money. I’ve tried to get the safety program up and going, but I do need help. I do not have those materials. I don’t have access to a lot of this material that we need to have as provided for all of our different departments throughout the county. And PayneWest said that they would absolutely be willing and able to come in and set that program up so we could get off of our feet and get going on it. Koefod has been great, Kim has been a wonderful cheerleader. She has brought in Sophie (Magnuson) from State Fund. That’s how we got the WorkSafe Champions project going…But I don’t see at this time where she has the capability to get a program up and going or help me get that program up and going like PayneWest can offer. That was a big reason why (the Insurance Committee) wanted to have PayneWest come in. We were under the information that they could also look at our claims so we could possibly get some of these claims closed down that were open that were costing the county money…to get our MOD rates down, to save us thousands and thousands of dollars. So I’m quite disheartened that (the Commission), for one, voted on this in a public meeting to go with PayneWest, and now, this has changed, and we’re going with Koefod. I guess I’m just blindsided by it all. I don’t know what else to say.”