A retired social worker is hoping to put sufficient pressure on the Public Employee Insurance Agency’s board before Thursday’s meeting to apply the brakes to proposed increases for active and pensioned state workers alike.

Not only has Marilyn Howells been working with a myriad of groups from labor to education, but the Huntington woman has created a special Web site to trumpet her cause, reachable at www.peiawatch.wordpress.com.

Even if the PEIA board turns a deaf ear, Howells is banking on some key lawmakers to take up the issue when the 2009 session opens next February.

“Things can be stopped,” said Howells, who worked 31 years for the Department of Health and Human Resources in the Huntington area.

“It’s difficult but apparently a lot of people are looking at it. I just think it’s better to have a public outcry right now so that the board backs down and doesn’t do anything. This was done so fast and so dirty.”

For retirees, Howells said the proposal shakes out to increases of 11, 17, 13 and 12 percent over the next four years through premium raises, or benefit cuts, or a combination of both.

“These increases compound from year to year and therefore would add up to a 64 percent increase in premiums,” she said.

This means a non-Medicare retiree is looking at the existing monthly $208 premium shooting up to about $341 per month.

Howells said the active workers would feel the sting of increases of 9, 14, 13 and 12 percent over the four-year span, or 57 percent by the start of the fourth year.

Employees with incomes of $20,000, $30,000, $36,000 and $42,000 would, in the PEIA family preferred plan, be paying yearly premiums of $2,362, $3,012, $3,516 and $4,389, respectively, she said.

“Those in the lowest part of each bracket will be paying over 10 percent of their income just for the premiums,” Howells said.

Such increases would be particularly hard on retired state workers, since their pensions are set and there is no built-in cost of living increase, she said.

“People were lulled into a false sense of security because they didn’t do a lot last year,” Howells said.

“They’re saying, ‘you haven’t had a premium increase in three years,’” she said. “No, but they added some co-payments a year and a half ago and did all this stuff to Medicare people.”

That leads to another area of dissent — anyone using PEIA as a supplement was forced to go on the Medicare Advantage Plan, which means they would be enrolled in a Preferred Provider Organization, or PPO, she said. In her estimation, this translated into a more narrow and restrictive network of getting medical treatment.

“This would mean an extra 15 percent to go to the Medicare Advantage,” Howell said.

“Yet, we’re going to end up with no access to some of the doctors. When you change to Medicare Advantage, you cannot have two supplements. Those people fortunate enough to work for the state and cross-insure their spouse, and the spouse works somewhere else that had a real insurance, like Blue Cross and Blue Shield insured you, when you go on regular Medicare, you can have two supplements. On Medicare Advantage, they take that right away.”

Howells also may be contacted at 304-529-2060 or by e-mail at savepeia@l ive.com.

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mannix@register-herald.com