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Sweetwater council approves agreement with Tommy Morris Agency to act as broker of record for city health benefits
Summary
The council approved an agreement naming Tommy Morris Agency as broker of record to evaluate sealed proposals for the city’s self-insured group health benefits; a council member raised questions about using a single agent and bid transparency.
The Sweetwater City Council on June 10 approved entering into an agreement with Tommy Morris Agency to serve as the city’s broker of record for insurance and to evaluate competitive sealed proposals for self-insured group health benefits to be presented at the July 8 council meeting.
During discussion, an unnamed council member questioned whether using the same agent repeatedly would limit market competition. "If we just use one agent all of the time, we're probably not gonna get a really good idea of what is out there in the market as far as health insurance is concerned," the council member said.
An agency representative (recorded in the meeting) responded that the agency had received bids from multiple carriers and said staff would provide the council a spread showing how proposals compared. When asked whether competing brokers ever submitted bids, the representative said yes for vision coverage and that the agency would share information with the city and present a comparison of proposals to the council.
When queried about how proposals are shared with the city manager, the representative said incumbent-carrier materials and other information are reviewed and that the council would ultimately make a selection after staff presents the options. The council voted to approve the agreement with Tommy Morris Agency to act as broker of record and to proceed with evaluating sealed proposals for consideration on July 8.
