Inmate medical care: More oversight, please

Inmate medical care: More oversight, please
Published 08:15 p.m., Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Some deals are too good to believe. They deserve scrutiny.

Take Correctional Managed Health Care, for example. It's the $98 million arrangement between the University of Connecticut Health Center and the state Department of Correction to provide inmate medical care.

Caring for the physical and mental health of the state's 17,000-plus prison population is expensive. Last year, dialysis treatment cost $46,000 per correctional patient. And inmates paid 265,888 visits to psychiatrists, psychologists and psychiatric nurse clinicians. Prescriptions totaled $12 million. And 40 percent of inmates take at least one medication. It's one of the biggest chunks of Correctional Managed Health Care's budget.

Perhaps this money is being well spent. But it's hard to say. That's because the pact between these two state entities is not subject to any outside, independent analysis for cost effectiveness. And, if the rationale behind continuing this pact is that UConn Health Center needs this deal to prop up its own finances, there's something wrong with rewarding its inefficiencies at taxpayer expense.

But that's not the worst part. Nobody ever competes with UConn Health Center to deliver prison health care. For 13 years, it's had a monopoly because the agreement is never put out to bid. So much for government transparency.

When you ask agency honchos like DOC spokesman Brian Garnett why it is this way, the answer goes like this -- because that's the way it's done, it's been this way since Gov. John G. Rowland's era.

But that's no explanation.

It's the same as me asking my mom, "Why do you cut the turkey legs off before cooking for Thanksgiving?" And she replies, "Cause that's the way Grandma Dina did it." Of course, our family's matriarch rationale was so the turkey fit in the roasting pan. The point is the original reason for these arrangements may no longer be valid. It strikes me that the UConn Health Center/DOC deal resembles my family's Thanksgiving culinary practices: irrational, inefficient and irritating.

Think what competitive bidding accomplishes. It ensures that the procurement process is fair and the state gets the best possible bang for its buck.

"There are private nonprofit providers who do this work in other states who achieve better outcomes," state Sen. Rob Kane, R-Watertown, says. "It's been this way for 13 years here, and no one's ever looked at this arrangement. It just goes along getting renewed with no competitive bidding, no review -- like nothing ever changes. With the $3.2 billion deficit we're facing in the next fiscal year, this is a real opportunity to reform government spending," Kane says. "We shouldn't squander this chance."

Wait a second. Don't all large state contracts require competitive bidding? Technically, this deal is not a contract. It's a memorandum of understanding between two state agencies, and is therefore not subject to state contracting requirements. Plenty of state lawmakers, including Kane, would like to see this change. In fact, state Sen. Toni Boucher, R-Wilton, has a bill wending its way through the Legislature that would require "competitive bidding" for all state contracts. Boucher's bill makes no mention of any memorandums of understanding. They aren't included in the bill, she says, adding that transparency suggests that they should be included.

Lawmakers should mandate that all multimillion-dollar deals between state agencies are put out to bid. That way the public can be assured its money is being well spent.

Connecticut Post Columnist MariAn Gail Brown can be reached at 203-330-6288 or mgbrown@ctpost.com.

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