The Sparks Group Health Care Committee heard midyear finance and cost reports on Tuesday, with the Sparks budget manager saying the fund is "to the good $746,000" through December. Wayne Webber, Sparks budget manager, presented the midyear financial results and described the fund’s current positive position.

Nate Kerr of LP Insurance delivered a calendar‑year 2025 cost analysis that showed enrollment pressure and higher claim costs. Kerr told the committee active‑employee enrollment categories were down slightly, employee claims were up about 8% and combined active‑and‑retiree per‑member costs were higher than the prior period. He said retiree enrollment has declined while retiree claims rose—"retiree only claims ... are up about 17% over the prior calendar year, averaging $1,292 per retiree per month." Kerr also reported an incurred‑but‑not‑reported (IBNR) liability of $1,222,000.

Third‑party administrator UMR, represented by Russ Garrett, provided supplemental detail through November. Garrett said the plan processed 41,780 claims and reported roughly $12,000,000 in total paid across medical, dental and pharmacy in his summary; he reported roughly 99% of claims processed in‑network, with network discounts yielding about a 61.2% savings. Garrett reported combined medical and pharmacy cost at $651.64 per member per month and noted emergency department activity (272 ED visits totaling about $957,000, or roughly $3,521 average paid per visit).

Garrett also told the committee that UMR has met its performance guarantees and has implemented coding fixes to address processing delays for healthy‑lifestyle incentive claims. "Some of the healthy lifestyle claims were getting miscoded ... that has been fixed and new coding has been put into place," Garrett said, and UMR is routing certain claims to a small, more experienced processing team to prevent duplicate payments and speed adjudication.

Committee members asked clarification questions about whether retiree figures reflected particular categories of claims; a retiree representative asked whether the retiree numbers reflected heart‑and‑lung claims, and Kerr replied that the exhibits show total health‑plan costs and do not include workers' compensation‑type payments. Chair and staff asked members to report any ongoing problems with healthy‑lifestyle claims for 2026 so UMR can monitor improvements.

Next steps: Nate Kerr is expected to return for further analysis and the committee said it will continue reviewing options for next year’s plan design and administration.