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Commissioners press for clarity after extension says SHIC counseling role is county‑funded
Summary
Commissioners asked whether the county-funded SHIC (Medicare counseling) coordinator position is at risk after a 10% cut; extension reported it runs a KDADS hotline, handles thousands of calls and reported $2.32M in estimated 2024 savings to county residents.
Commissioners pressed for clarity about the SHIC Medicare‑counseling program after Dr. Brantley explained an agent who oversees SHIC is paid with county funds and the position became vacant during the county’s 10% budget cut.
Brantley said KDADS grants help pay two part‑time coordinators and volunteer mileage and supplies, but the primary supervisory agent is funded by the county: "We do receive money from KDADS, for the SHIC program, but that helps to pay for the 2 part time coordinators... but the person who oversees the SHIC program and does our adult development programming is paid with county money," she said.
Extension staff reported program scale in their impact report: over 2,000 people seen in counseling, roughly 3,000 phone calls answered and 2,509 hotline calls. Brantley also said the program’s work produced estimated cost savings for Sedgwick County residents of $2,323,034 in 2024.
County staff and commissioners discussed coordination with the Department on Aging and senior centers; county staff said the Department on Aging receives a small KDADS grant (less than $5,000) and that extension carries much of the seasonal counseling load during open enrollment. Commissioners asked staff to evaluate whether the county block grant is best directed to extension or redistributed to other providers.
No formal decision was taken; commissioners asked staff to itemize the SHIC funding line in budget materials so the commission can consider preserving the counseling capacity during the forthcoming budget deliberations.
