Welcome everybody to our council meeting.

Our study session.

Our study session for September 14th, 2026.

All our council are present.

Item one is to review the agenda for tonight's meeting.

I know we went over the agenda previously, Council.

Are there any other questions for the agenda for tonight?

I know we thoroughly went through a lot of information.

Hearing nothing right now.

Right, that was easy.

I should have had that button right there, but I didn't.

Then we'll move forward to item two A is a presentation of discussion on the 2027 employee benefits and wellness programs.

Jan and your team.

You brought HR with you too.

Good afternoon, Mayor, Vice Mayor, Council Members, Terry Overby, and I have Jan Ashley here with me.

We are here to talk about the 2027 employee benefits and wellness programs.

So I'm going to turn the time over to Jan, and she's going to begin her presentation.

Thank you, Terry.

Mayor and Council members.

Very pleased to be here this evening to present our highlights of the city's employer benefit programs that are planned for 2027.

We're very pleased to be continuing forward with our valued third party administrators and networks with service providers like Signa Healthcare, Med Impact, Paid Health, Delta Dental, VSP, Navia Benefits, ComSec, the Standard, WebMD for our wellness technology platforms and health coaching, and Premise Health and our providers at our employee health and wellness center.

Go to the next slide.

Okay.

There are several drivers that are the foundation and the infrastructure for the employer benefit programs that the city offers to both employees and retirees.

We strive to find a balance between financial considerations and employee engagement opportunities to support our recruitment, retention, and satisfaction goals for the employees of the organization.

High brand, high cost brand drug, and specialty drug, which is very high cost specialty drug arena, is also very specific in having an impact on our plan design and development.

These are all heavily impacted by consumer demand that is out there generated from multi-sources, whether that be advertising, media platforms, and of course the prescription drug pipeline itself of new high-cost entries every year.

Employee engagement is at the heart of the city's culture that drives our quality and commitment to services to residents, businesses, and visitors to Mesa.

It's important to employees that we deliver benefit programs that focus on free primary and preventive care services for their the employees, the retirees, and their respective covered family members.

High coverage in comprehensive plan designs, quality networks and access, and manageable out-of-pocket expenses.

That is in the health and wellness arena, and then that's also in the lifestyle arena, family and asset protection for our life insurance products that are available to employees and family members.

And last but not least, lifetime sustainable retiree health care plan access.

So all of that, along with those financial drivers that I talked about a little earlier, lead us to where we're planning to be for 2027.

So I'm going to start out first with what's not changing in our medical plans in 27.

And these are all those value-driven, financially driven benchmarks of what our plans have today.

So comprehensive high value coverage in three-plan options, experienced quality TPA administrators and broad national networks, the free employee health and wellness center activities for primary and preventive care.

No change in in-network medical deductibles, coinsurance rates, and co-pay amounts.

Continued high, 100% coverage in network for preventive care, high-tech radiology, behavioral health care, and our Cigna affiliated MD Live virtual urgent care services.

And then lastly, to say that we are amongst one of the few that provide the broad eligibility across all full-time and part-time benefit eligible active employees and retirees and their respective spouses and commit partners and children up to age 26.

So it's a very broad spectrum of eligibility, which right at this very moment we have over 16,000 members are in this eligible and enrolled category.

What is changing in 2027 is all driven by those combination of the financial factors and what employee engagement and satisfaction would drive us to do.

So number one, we have some enhancements in the in-network outpatient service area on the basic and the choice plans, which is the two plans that have the highest level of enrollment.

Over 90% of our active employees and retirees are in one or the other of those two plans.

The basic, the choice, and the copay plans.

And this would be two affiliated CINAHA relationships with what is known as Pathwell Bone and Joint.

It's a voluntary case management and network steerage opportunity that allows people to get into a bundled environment and potentially be able to have MSK type surgeries at zero cost to that member if they're in that particular network and go through the case management services.

The Cigna Hinge Health opportunity is also in the MSK environment, and it provides a virtual clinician-supported exercise therapy program that's available to take the place of or be in addition to regular rehabilitation therapy services like physical therapy or occupational therapy, et cetera, which of course will still be made available within the plan in network.

The cost containment opportunities that go along with these enhancements are to remove or discourage the use of these services in an out-of-network environment, which is a costly way to receive them in the first place, and it's more cost to the plan for those out-of-network services to be provided.

So no out-of-network coverage in the basic and the choice plans for inpatient hospital care, including professional services.

So that would mean medical, surgical and behavioral health services, the facility and professional services that go along with that, except in case of an actual emergency, a true life or limb-threatening emergency.

A person needs to go to the nearest available facility to take care of those needs, and that would not be considered a no-coverage environment, even if it were out of network.

The other area of cost containment is no coverage out of network for outpatient laboratory and lab services and radiology services.

So all those services that I said up above in network would be 100% covered.

If you go out of network for those services, no coverage.

Again, except for emergencies.

Prescription drugs and outpatient prescription drug program is one of the highest cost drivers in the medical plan today, and it will continue to be so with the trends that are sitting out there in the national pharmaceutical arena going forward.

So we're going to make a few changes to the prescription drug program, not a change overall, but some minor changes on the maximum out of pocket co-pays that members might pay in particularly high cost areas.

So no changes at all in the generic drug category.

But when it comes to the brand drug category, we have two areas of that.

We have the non-specialty brand drugs, and then we have the specialty brand drugs.