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Summary:
– Clay Bullard urges privatization to save taxpayer dollars.
– Oklahoma mental health department requests $71 million more funding.
– Proposal to shift some responsibilities to State Department of Health.
OKLAHOMA CITY — Lawmakers should consider privatizing some of the state’s mental health facilities to streamline services and save taxpayer dollars, one top health care leader said Tuesday.
Despite an emergency legislative appropriation of $19.6 million last month, the Oklahoma Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services continues to struggle to pay its bills on time, said Clay Bullard, Oklahoma Health Care Authority director.
He said the mental health department’s financial instability is harming his agency, which is responsible for administering the state’s Medicaid program.
“We have a situation where one agency’s failure creates a second failure for a secondary agency, the secondary agency being the larger agency, which provides services to 1 in 4 Oklahomans,” Bullard said.
The Health Care Authority has already requested nearly half a billion dollars from the Legislature to adjust for changes in the federal dollars coming to the state and address cash flow issues.
Gregory Slavonic, commissioner of the Oklahoma mental health department, said his agency is going to need an additional $29 million to cover Medicaid matching costs for the current budget year.
They will also need an additional $29 million for the same purpose in the upcoming budget year along with $30.2 million to implement a court-ordered competency restoration settlement agreement and $22.5 million to pay for technology upgrades.
This is $71 million greater than the agency’s initial October budget projection.
Bullard said privatizing some mental health facilities and services, or moving them under the purview of another agency, could save taxpayers money and also ensure they are better run.
“We continue to see the government is not great at managing facilities and large numbers of staff,” he said. “Private companies can do that much better and can deliver services.”
The Mental Health Department has an existing request for proposals to potentially privatize their state-run Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinics, which provide mental health and substance abuse treatment to all, regardless of ability to pay.
Bullard said lawmakers should consider shifting other agency responsibilities to the State Department of Health, including the implementation and oversight of the competency restoration consent decree.
Slavonic and Bullard suggested that state Health Commissioner Keith Reed temporarily lead both agencies if lawmakers allow it. Currently, state law bars officials from leading more than one agency at a time.
Slavonic, who was appointed by Gov. Kevin Stitt in an interim role, said he intends to leave the mental health agency at the end of the legislative session in May.
“All of our consumers and our patients will still get what they need,” said Jennifer Hogan, a spokesperson for the Mental Health Department, after Tuesday’s press conference. “It may be under a different moniker, maybe within a different department, but all of those services will remain.”
Lawmakers first became aware of the mental health department’s budget deficiencies last year when the agency said it would need millions in emergency legislative appropriations. At one point feared, the agency feared it could not make payroll. Legislators held investigative hearings, which led to them voting to fire the former commissioner.
Bullard said no lawmaker has yet drafted or agreed to legislation to make any of these proposed changes, but said the plan has been presented to them with “good reception.”
Sen. Paul Rosino, R-Oklahoma City, who chairs the Senate Health and Human Services Committee, wasn’t given a heads up on the announcement and wasn’t able to comment yet, a Senate spokesperson said.
Rep. Preston Stinson, R-Edmond, who chairs the House Health Budget Committee, said he wasn’t familiar enough with the proposals to comment.
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