Linn County to cut 20 union jobs

Linn County no longer will receive a special cost waiver from the state of Iowa and so will be forced to eliminate about 20 Linn County jobs held by union workers who provide mental health and development disability services.

Linda Langston, Linn County supervisor, on Thursday said employees in those jobs are being notified that the services that Linn County has provided in its community supported living program will be taken over by private providers and non-profit providers offering similar services in the community at less cost to the state of Iowa.

Many other counties already use only private or non-profit providers for such services because the cost is less than what Linn County, with employees paid union wages, has been paying, Langston said.

She said Magellan of Iowa, the health services firm now handling the administration and billing of the mental health and development disabilities program for the state, will pay about $47 an hour for community supported living services that cost Linn County about $70 an hour to provide. The county has enjoyed a reimbursement waiver to allow state funds to cover its costs, but that waiver is ending, she said.

"There's no way we can meet the reimbursement (now)," Langston said.

The clients who receive services from the county's community supported living program generally are disabled adults, many of whom live in group settings. The program helps the clients to shop for groceries, handle money, get to the doctor and otherwise live independently.

The county layoffs won't take place immediately, but will occur over some months as the transition is made from public-sector employees to those in the private and non-profit sectors, Langston said. Some facing layoffs may be able to bump less-senior county workers in other positions, she said.

The supervisors, she said, became aware of the coming change about six weeks ago.

She added that this is the second Linn County helping-services program that has been eliminated for cost. Earlier, the county's protected payee program, which helped manage money for certain disabled adults, had been ended and the work shifted to private and non-profit companies.

Langston said the change in the protected payee program costs the clients more than it had under the county's management because the county had used local tax dollars to subsidize the work. The argument for having the community supported living program under Linn County's control has been, in part, that better employee compensation has meant less employee turnover, she said.