Iowa DHS Director Charles Palmer to retire in June

Charles 'Chuck” Palmer - who led the Iowa Department of Human Services through massive system changes including the mental health redesign, Medicaid expansion and the move to Medicaid managed care - will retire from his post June 16.

The announcement comes as a group of legislators have scheduled a joint hearing to investigate the department following the death of a Perry teenager and a few calls from Democratic Senators for his resignation.

On Monday, the House and Senate Government Oversight Committees will look into multiple deaths of adopted children in the care of the DHS system.

Authorities found Sabrina Ray, 16, unresponsive in her home on May 12. The State Medical Examiner noted in its initial autopsy results that Ray died from severe malnutrition, weighing 56 pounds at the time of her death.

According to authorities, DHS was monitoring her home due to earlier complaints of abuse. At the time, child protective investigators said they found no evidence.

Her parents, Marc Alan Ray and Misty Jo Ray, were arrested in mid-May and face multiple neglect charges in her death. On the day of Palmer's announcement, law enforcement reported the arrest of three other family members.

The teenager's death follows the death of another teenager - Natalie Finn, 16, also adopted - in West Des Moines who died last year of starvation. Finn's parents were arrested and await trial.

Then-Gov. Terry Branstad named Palmer as director of DHS twice, once in 1989 where he served until 1999, and again in 2011. Before being director of DHS, Palmer was the department's administrator of the Division of Mental Health.

'Chuck has been a dedicated public servant who has spent his life trying to improve the lives of Iowans,” said Gov. Kim Reynolds in a news release. 'I want to wish him well as he enjoys his retirement with his wife and family.”

Under Palmer's leadership, DHS expanded its Medicaid program to more than 150,000 low-income adults through the Iowa Health and Wellness program in 2014 and redesigned the mental health system from one in which each of the state's 99 counties were responsible for providing services to a more regional approach.

But he also oversaw and carried out many of Branstad's more controversial decisions, including the closures of the Iowa Juvenile Home in Toledo in 2014 and two Mental Health Institutes, in Clarinda and Mount Pleasant, in 2015 as well as the move to Medicaid managed care in April 2016.

Democratic lawmakers and the head of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Iowa Council 61, the state's largest union, sued to block the closure of the juvenile home, though that effort was fruitless. At least three patients died after being transferred from the Clarinda Mental Health Institute to other care facilities.

Meanwhile, the first year of Medicaid managed care - in which the state handed over its $5 billion program with nearly 600,000 enrollees to three private insurance companies - has seen mixed results. Providers still are reporting late, inaccurate or missing payments while the insurance companies are each losing more than $100 million.

Democratic legislators hope the change in leadership will allow them to work on some of the bigger issues they believe surround DHS and the Medicaid system.

'With Director Palmer's retirement comes the opportunity to address some of the problematic issues around casework and managed care,” said Sen. Liz Mathis, D-Robins and ranking member of the Senate Human Services Committee. 'I hope Gov. Reynolds will consider someone who is willing to work with both sides of the aisle to accomplish more accessibility to critical services like mental health. I have worked with Director Palmer in a number of ways, from strategic planning on children's mental health to Medicaid and managed care. He had a difficult job, but Director Palmer was professional and accessible to me as a legislator. I wish him well.”

An interim director has not been named yet, according to Reynold's office.

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