Jeff Russell, R-At Large, looks at budget documents during Monday’s City Council meeting. P-J photo by Sara Holthouse

Jamestown officials are scrambling to secure Medicare reimbursement dollars that could reduce the city’s proposed 7.79% tax increase.

During budget deliberations Monday, City Council members discussed the transition of city retirees from city-backed health insurance onto Medicare. About 150 people remain on the city’s insurance and not Medicare, following the previous amount of around 310. It was discussed pursuing the people that remain on the insurance and explaining to them that there are positive benefits for both them and the city, and that it helps the city save money.

Russell Bonfiglio, R-At Large, said he was a part of the committee that worked on that last year and that he has heard no complaints from people, including those who have left the area for places like Florida. He said it was a concern that the insurance would not be accepted if they were out of town, and that that is not the case. He said those aged 65 and over should be pursued by the city for this to get them off of the city’s insurance.

Jeff Russell, R-At Large and Public Safety Committee chairman, said a big issue with this that people may not be aware of is that there is roughly $1 million 3 that the city was supposed to get back from the Medicare Advantage Plan that the previous administration did not go after.

“We were supposed to get money back from Medicare as a result of those retirees moving over to the Medicare Advantage Plan,” Russell said. “Those monies were left on the table and they didn’t go and get reimbursed for those monies.”

Russell acknowledged that City Comptroller Erika Thomas has been working on getting that reimbursement back. Thomas said the contract has expired and in talking with the state, they are trying to figure out what the city needs to do to get that money.

“There’s a couple of things that happened,” Thomas said. “The original contract, which was where you sign up and the first $25 thousand the city would pay and we would get reimbursed for. Not a lot of people signed up for that. So they went to J1 and J2, J1 there is no premium, so the retirees don’t take anything and J2 they take in $50. A lot more people jumped up on that.”

However, Thomas said that was not a contract or program that the state was aware of, so they were surprised when she told them about that and now it has to be determined if a new contract is needed or an extension of the original.

Bonfiglio and Russell acknowledged that Thomas was not a part of the administration but questioned what happened to allow them to miss this reimbursement.

“I’ve personally been upset over that, the fact that the committee got together and worked so hard and that we were all put together to save funds and save the taxpayers money,” Russell said. “It was a win for everyone, so you just assume that if a committee is put together by the prior administration to save money that that prior administration is going to go after those monies and we shouldn’t have to babysit them to go after those monies.”

Russell said now after all of the work done by the committee they have $1 million left on the table, adding that he had asked for union presidents and everyone else that should be involved to be involved and for complete transparency. He added that he had also asked the previous mayor, Eddie Sunquist, to not attend the meetings, which Sunquist was fine with, but that he was upset that $1 million was still left on the table.

“If that million dollars was in this budget now, what a difference that it would make,” Russell said.

Conversation continued, focusing on assuming people in the previous administration would have gone after the money, but Russell added that he takes some accountability personally because he felt there should have been more oversight.

Council President Anthony Dolce asked Thomas if they might have an answer as to whether or not they could get this money reimbursed before they needed to vote on the budget. Thomas said they are not sure what direction the state could go, if they could get an extension to the original contract, but she said she has sent some spreadsheets and has been reaching out. She added that the grant to move retirees to medicare was a $1 million 5 grant that $113 thousand has been used of, leaving the $1 million 3.

It was also discussed that the comptroller would have had the responsibility most likely to go after the money, but there was no comptroller at the time, though Thomas said members of the comptroller’s office had worked on it before she came in, and that she was not sure if anyone had. Bonfiglio acknowledged that things were a mess at the time, and Russell asked if there was anything that the current council could do to help Thomas with getting the money. Dolce suggested Corporation Counsel Elliot Raimondo look into it from a legal standpoint as well.

“If we just knew ahead of time that the money is coming, some of it coming, all of it coming, none of it coming, I mean that’s a lot of money,” Dolce said. “That would solve pretty much most of the tax increase right there.”

Dolce recommended seeing if there was something that they could push hard on to try and get the money for this upcoming budget. Thomas said to make sure to keep in mind that this money will be a one time thing, and that if they manage to get the money for 2025 it will not be there for 2026.