Advisory committee hears fund report: $8 million balance, new phone-surcharge revenue due this year

Peter Brown, president of the Uniform Professional Firefighters Association and chair of the Firefighter Cancer Relief Fund advisory committee, convened the committee's first official meeting and asked the state treasurer's staff to summarize the fund's condition.

"The most recent report . . . reported a balance in the fund of over $8,000,000," Deputy State Treasurer Sarah Sanders told the committee, adding that the treasurer's office recorded $336,000 in claims paid in fiscal year 2025 and that total claims over the last three years are less than $1 million.

The nut of the meeting was whether the fund, established under state statute, is solvent and whether additional revenue or insurance purchases will be needed. Committee members heard that a new recurring revenue source ' a 5-cent surcharge on certain phone lines ' is scheduled to begin Oct. 1 and is expected to bring in roughly $1.8 million to $2.2 million in the first year and $2.4 million to $3.0 million in future years, though members noted the start date may be delayed while telecom carriers implement the charge.

The treasurer's staff said existing annual municipal contributions of $10 per firefighter raised about $80,000 last year and that interest income from invested balances (recently returning about 4% to 5%) also contributes to revenues. "If you haven't heard, we have a new revenue source coming in Oct. 1, which is a 5¢ surcharge on phone bills . . . expected to bring in $2,000,000 a year," Sanders said.

Committee members and staff discussed claims volumes and the administration of two parallel programs: an older wage-replacement program and a newer municipal reimbursement program that covers lost wages and out-of-pocket medical costs not covered by a firefighter's health plan. John Carew, who chairs the wage-replacement program, said his group is trying to educate members so that applicants use the municipal reimbursement program when appropriate. "A lot of people are applying to the wage replacement fund when they should be applying to the municipal reimbursement side," Carew said.

Sanders reported that five municipalities had received reimbursements as of the July report: Hartford, Hamden, New London, East Tatham and Westport (as listed in the treasurer's report). She and staff said they could provide a more detailed split of payments between the two programs and that the treasurer's office can prepare a three-year summary of revenues and expenditures and run projection scenarios for the committee's next meeting.

Members raised the question of purchasing an insurance product to stabilize funding rather than remaining entirely self-insured. Jim Marler, identified in the meeting as a co-chair and a financial planner with New England Financial Group, volunteered to collect information on insurance arrangements other states use and to work with the treasurer's office. "There are a number of states that do handle their cancer program through an insurance product," Marler said, while others noted that past state-administered benefits (such as a police and firefighters survivors fund) had at one time been backed by a private insurer before administration moved to a state program.

John Harrington, director of retirement services, recounted historical reasons the state and municipalities had at times preferred self-insurance: administrative costs for small-volume programs can be large, and insurers may price the risk high. Several committee members and municipal representatives said they and municipal associations had resisted folding these claims into the standard workers'comp system, in part because of concerns it would raise municipal workers'comp costs and because establishing medical causation for specific cancers in workers'comp proceedings has historically been difficult.

Committee members agreed on two near-term follow-ups: the treasurer's office will provide a three-year revenue and expenditure summary and run projection scenarios, and committee volunteers will research insurance-product options used in other states. The committee set a tentative next meeting date for Monday, Jan. 12 at 1 p.m.

The advisory committee is charged under state law to evaluate the fund's solvency annually, identify new funding mechanisms and consider the need to purchase insurance products; members said they expect to return to those statutory priorities with more claims and revenue data at the January meeting.