IE Business Daily Business news for the Inland Empire.
Unlike some of California’s major metropolitan areas, the two-county region isn’t close to meeting its registration goal by March 31, the program’s open-enrollment deadline.
The early returns are in on Obamcare sign-ups in California, and the Inland Empire has some catching up to do.
Nearly 40,000 residents of Riverside and San Bernardino counties registered for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act between Oct. 1 and Dec. 31 of last year, according to data released recently by Covered California, the state agency that is administering the program, and the California Department of Health Care Services.
That’s 52 percent of what both entities hope to sign up in the Inland region by March 31 when the six-month open-enrollment period ends.
While that’s not a bad number, it doesn’t measure up with the number of people registered for the Affordable Care Act in some of California’s other metropolitan areas. For example, Orange and San Diego counties have already exceeded their six-month goals by 13 percent and five percent respectively, and Los Angeles County has met 74 percent of its goal, according to the data.
Much of Northern California also outperformed the Inland Empire: the Bay Area topped its sign-up goal by 30 percent, the central coastal region by eight percent while Sacramento met 95 percent of its goal. Only Fresno lagged behind the Inland region, at 47 percent of its goal, by the end of last year.
Statewide, Covered California registered slightly more than 500,000 residents for Obamacare, or 86 percent of its sixth-month goal, according to the data.
Those numbers mean the Inland region will have to work harder than most other markets to meet its goal, but that goal is still attainable and probably will be reached, said Edith Lara-Trad, spokeswoman for Covered California in the Inland Empire.
Between now and the end of next month, officials with the Inland office of Covered California plan “to take a more regional approach” to signing up residents for the Affordable Care Act, including reaching out to more Spanish-speaking residents.
They will still have a battle on their hands. Both counties have a number of small, remote communities that are difficult to reach, which might explain why the Inland Empire is lagging behind most other markets in the effort to enroll people.
“There are a lot of rural areas we have to visit, but we’re still signing people up and on the overall things look positive,” Lara-Trad said. “The numbers are still good in both counties, and we have two months to go. All we can do is keep increasing our efforts.”
At least seven million people across the countryn must sign up for Obamacare by March 31 for the program to be cost-effective, according to President Obama.
The Affordable Care Act is probably the most significant change to the U.S. healthcare system since 1965, when President Lyndon Johnson signed Medicare and Medicaid into law. It’s goal is to cut the cost of medical care across the board by reducing the number of people without insurance, and uses tax credits, subsidies and mandates to employers and individuals to meet that goal.
The act, which applies to businesses with 50 or more employees, guarantees that no one will be denied coverage because of a pre-existing condition, and it creates what it calls an individual mandate. That means that anyone who doesn’t have health insurance must buy a policy from a private insurer.
Barring any appeals, most of the Affordable Care Act will be in place by the end of this year, and the entire act will be in place by 2020.
President Obama made passing comprehensive health care reform the major domestic goal of his administration, but the program met with strident opposition from Republicans and has struggled to get off the ground, most notably with glitches on the federal website that made it difficult for people to enroll.
Those problems have mostly been fixed, but it’s still too early to pass final judgment on the program, said Isabel C. Safie, an attorney with Best, Best & Krieger in Riverside.
Safie and several of her fellow attorneys have spent the past year advising local government agencies and some small businesses on how to comply with the Affordable Care Act. Safie and her colleagues make sure their clients aren’t failing to insure employees who don’t have medical insurance and who are eligible for Obamacre. A violation can trigger a $2,000-$3,000 annual fine per employee.
Even one uninsured worker who is eligible for the program can lead to that penalty, which might explain why most businesses – despite the program’s complexity and mass of regulations – are trying to make it work.
Some clients raise two to three compliance issues a week, most of which are resolved quickly, Safie said.
“We haven’t run into a lot of resistance from employers,” Safie said. “Most of them are trying to make it work. I don’t think anyone is going out of business because of the Affordable Care Act, although there definitely have been growing pains. Some places are using it to show their employees how much they value them.”
Maybe the most striking aspect about the Inland Empire sign-ups is that about 35,000 of them are eligible for some government subsidy, said Dimitrios Alexiou, Inland Empire regional vice president for the Hospital Association of Southern California.
“That’s a pretty high number, and I think it shows the need for some kind of health insurance program,” Alexiou said. “I think having so many people who are subsidy eligible is a bigger issue than having 52 percent of the goal signed up so far, which I don’t think is anything to worry about.”
The association supports getting healthcare insurance to as many people as possible but has never taken a formal stand, pro or con, on the Affordable Care Act.
One year from now, the Affordable Care Act probably will be operating relatively smoothly, although it remains to be seen how much it will drive down healthcare costs by getting more people insured, Alexiou said.
“I expect to see higher enrollment numbers in a year,” Alexiou said.
