As the caseload of people enrolled in a health insurance program for Arizona’s poorest residents grows, the state agency that operates the program is cutting staff.
The Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System — AHCCCS — will layoff 82 employees, who will be notified within the next five days, according to an internal memo sent by AHCCS director Anthony D. Rodgers on Monday.
Agency officials on Tuesday morning would not give any more details about which employees will lose their jobs.
“Even federal stimulus funds are inadequate to cover the gap in general fund revenues,” Rodgers wrote. “It is not without a great deal of gut wrenching and sleepless nights that AHCCCS executive management has come to the conclusion that we will need to take additional expenditure reduction actions.
“After careful review of all alternatives, I see no reasonable alternative to address our unprecedented budget shortfall.”
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Rodgers said ultimately 70 staff positions will be eliminated from the agency, which employs 1,218 people, including some in Tucson. The exact number was not immediately available.
Nearly one in five Arizonans are enrolled in AHCCCS, which has strict guidelines and enrolls only the state’s poorest residents, in general people making 100 percent or less of the federal poverty level. That would mean an annual income of less than $10,400 for an individual, or less than $21,200 for a family of four.
As of Dec. 1, there were 184,260 Pima County residents enrolled in AHCCCS — 18 percent of the population, or nearly one in five local residents.
AHCCCS rolls expanded in 2008 as the economy slid. During the last few months of the year, 70,000 Arizonans, including 10,000 in Pima County, enrolled in AHCCCS.
Over a five-year period — between 2003 and 2008 — the number of Pima County residents on AHCCCS jumped by 20 percent. During that same time period, the local population increased by about 11 percent.
AHCCCS is funded with a blend of state and federal money. This fiscal year , the agency budget is $6.2 billion, $1.4 billion of which comes from the state of Arizona.
