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Gardner mayor outlines four health-insurance options as FY27 budget gap looms
Summary
Mayor Michael Mickelson told the Gardner School Committee the city faces a large insurance-driven budget pressure and presented four options that could reduce a 12.5% rate increase; a formal decision is needed by May 1 to meet notification and open-enrollment deadlines.
Mayor Michael Mickelson told the Gardner School Committee on Monday that rapidly rising health-insurance costs are the principal driver of the city’s projected budget shortfall for fiscal 2027 and outlined four options to address the increase.
Mickelson said one option is to make no plan changes, which would result in a 12.5% rate increase. A broker-proposed alternative would keep Blue Cross Blue Shield but adopt the Group Insurance Commission benchmark plan; under that approach the city could lower the projected increase to about 10% and save roughly $300,000–$350,000 on the municipal budget.
Why it matters: Insurance increases have compounded over several years and are the largest single budget driver the mayor identified. The mayor said the city’s…
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