Burke County DSS reports steady Medicaid rolls, rising foster-care entries and early issues after Healthy Blue rollout
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Summary
Burke County Department of Social Services told commissioners it has 13 job openings (about a 7.5% vacancy rate), serves roughly 28,000 Medicaid recipients, and reported 190 children in foster care with 125 entries and 102 exits for the fiscal year to date; staff said the new statewide foster-care contractor, Healthy Blue, has experienced early 'growing pains.'
At a January meeting of the Burke County Board of Commissioners, a Department of Social Services representative summarized staffing, caseload and program changes, and answered commissioners’ questions about an early transition to a new foster-care Medicaid contractor.
Corey, speaking for DSS, said the department had 13 current openings — "about a 7 and a half percent vacancy rate" — and that three candidates had interviews scheduled that could reduce the vacancy rate to roughly 5 percent. He said recruiting and retaining Child Protective Services social workers remains difficult and that recent hires improved the department’s full-time staffing in November.
Corey said Medicaid enrollment has been stable at about 28,000 recipients and that food-nutrition cases were "around 10,400," a slight drop of roughly 300 cases in November. On foster care, he reported a point-in-time figure: "We had a 190 kids in care." For the fiscal year to date, he said there were 125 entries into foster care and 102 exits — the first year since 2021 with a net increase in entries.
Corey addressed the county’s transition to Healthy Blue for foster-care Medicaid management, which went live Dec. 1. He described the change as intended to standardize placement rates across regions but said the first month "has been a little bit challenging," citing staff hiring, unclear role definitions and outstanding provider contracts as the primary problems. "They had sort of different understanding of what their their role was," he said, calling the issues "normal growing pains" that he expects will be resolved over time.
A commissioner asked for details about the "hiccups" with Healthy Blue; Corey reiterated that much of the difficulty stemmed from standing up a new operation, renegotiating provider contracts previously held by Local Management Entities, and communication problems between contractors and counties.
After the discussion, a motion to accept the DSS report was made and recorded on the agenda; the board recorded a tally of "5 0."
