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* Hannah Meisel at the Daily Line…
The state of Illinois has lost out on an estimated $10.7 million in federal matching dollars during the past four fiscal years as a result of “miscoding errors” that marked American citizens or permanent residents as undocumented in the state’s Covering All Kids health insurance program, according to a new audit.
Auditor General Frank Mautino’s office found the state likely lost out on $2.6 million in federal matching dollars in the 2018 fiscal year because of the persistent and widespread errors within the All Kids program, noting this has been an issue since the first time the program was audited a decade ago. […]
All Kids, which offers universal health care to Illinois children regardless of how much their family earned, was expanded a few years later to include undocumented immigrant children. But Illinois’ Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act moved some citizens and documented immigrants to Medicaid, instead of the expanded All Kids program.
Though the participation rate of undocumented immigrant children in All Kids has dropped precipitously in the past decade — from 54,000 in 2009 to 22,000 in 2018 — the new audit found that number inaccurate. In the 2018 fiscal year, Mautino’s office found more than 4,200 All Kids recipients who had been listed as undocumented, but actually had verified social security numbers or alien registration numbers.
It’s a tiny amount of money in the grand scheme of things, but when the budget is this tight every dollar is important. And these findings date back to 2014. Do better, already.
posted by Rich Miller
Monday, Jan 27, 20 @ 1:11 pm
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Can we get the money back now that we found the mistake? Like when you fill out an amended tax form?
Comment by Da Big Bad Wolf Monday, Jan 27, 20 @ 1:36 pm
Wolf, going back to correct drawdown amount prior to the current fiscal is laden with complications.
HFS is doing the best it can. Federally funded, State managed Union shop. Do not expect miracles.
Comment by Al Monday, Jan 27, 20 @ 1:55 pm
==Union shop==
What does that have to do with anything?
Comment by Demoralized Monday, Jan 27, 20 @ 1:59 pm
Demoralized- when I was younger I asked the same question.
Comment by Al Monday, Jan 27, 20 @ 2:16 pm
==Union shop.==
I was going to comment upon the ERPs they’re suffering with, the GOP inspired “eligibility redetrminations” …
Comment by Anyone Remember Monday, Jan 27, 20 @ 2:17 pm
== Demoralized- when I was younger I asked the same question.==
Well I’m old so what’s the answer?
Comment by Da Big Bad Wolf Monday, Jan 27, 20 @ 2:23 pm
Given the amount of money that often is at stake, wouldn’t it be worthwhile to staff a state office somewhere that just makes sure IL is maximizing the federal dollars it could receive - seems like it’d pay for itself and then more.
Comment by ChicagoVinny Monday, Jan 27, 20 @ 2:29 pm
== ChicagoVinny - I agree with your idea, in concept. However, my assumption is that this would make one more layer of bureaucracy that would slow down the state’s receipt of federal funds. Typically the state (IMHO) would only check to make sure t’s are dotted on federal funding requests, which might catch some errors. In general, the staff who would be performing this work wouldn’t be experts in all of the different, highly specialized federal programs that many state agencies leverage. All Kids is just one program; think of the other state agencies and how many of them receive federal funds through multiple different programs and multiple federal funding sources.
Comment by Nic Tuesday, Jan 28, 20 @ 8:04 am