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County administrator urges local push on federal bill; shelter bids under review, application work with OTDA ongoing
Summary
County Administrator Corso asked legislators to oppose a federal bill that could cut human-services funding; he also said five shelter-development bids arrived and county staff are working with OTDA to prepare a competitive application and identify a service provider.
Tompkins County’s administrator told the Health and Human Services Committee that county officials are urging representatives to oppose a draft federal funding bill that, as presented to counties, could significantly reduce human-services funding and increase the number of uninsured residents by 2029.
County Administrator Corso described a call with a statewide association and said the association’s guidance is to ask counties to encourage their federal representatives to vote no on the bill in its current form. "The call is for us to reach out to our representatives to vote no on the current bill ... because basically we are facing losing in essence of $15,000,000,000 a year for human services alone," Corso said. He added that estimates discussed on the call project about 200,000 people could lose health insurance by 2029 if the bill were enacted in its current form.
Corso also updated the committee on shelter procurement and state application work. He said the county received five bids for the shelter development project and that one seemed nonviable while four were competitive. County staff plan to begin bid-review work and asked the committee about the degree of involvement members want in that review. Corso said the county met with OTDA to review a concept paper and that the strongest portion of a competitive application will be identification of the service provider; the county aims to secure a provider in June to participate in application development.
Corso provided scheduling updates on hiring: interviews for a Whole Health commissioner are in final stages and may be completed by the end of the month; Department of Social Services candidate interviews will begin next week with the county aiming to complete hiring timelines by mid-June.
The county moved into an executive session at the meeting under Article 7, Section 105 of the Public Officers Law to discuss personnel matters; the motion to enter executive session was moved by Sean and seconded by Randy and approved by the committee.
