Employees, rather than employers, will soon choose their own health insurers—either through the Obamacare exchanges or through private exchanges. Does that mean health insurance brokers, the people who match up employers with insurers, will no longer be needed?
Ersal Ozdemir, who heads the development and construction firm Keystone Group, has charmed elected officials for years with big ideas—and hundreds of thousands of dollars in political contributions.
Banks and credit unions facing more competition from online lenders—and now even from big-box stores offering financial products—are working harder to get a bigger piece of a customer’s wallet over the long haul.
Gregg W. Throgmartin is stepping down, a move that will leave the retailer without executive leadership from a member of its founding family for the first time since the first store opened in 1955.
Paul J. Page was one of four principals of troubled Indianapolis-based condo firm Page Development, which spearheaded the Villagio at Page Pointe project at the south edge of downtown.
Only 18 months after becoming a director, Solso is preparing to slide into a much bigger job in January—non-executive chairman of the Detroit company.
Tom Fischer, chief financial and chief operating officer of Community Health Network, departed suddenly this month. Sources with knowledge of the situation described Fischer’s exit as a firing. But a Community spokeswoman said Fischer resigned in a private meeting with Community CEO Bryan Mills. Fischer, 60, who joined Community as CFO in 2005, declined to comment. Mills and Fischer have been close friends for decades, dating to the time they both worked for the Ernst & Young accounting firm. Now Holly Millard, Community’s chief accounting officer, is serving as interim CFO while Community searches for a replacement. Community is trying to cut expenses 15 percent to 20 percent, including via staff reductions. Community laid off more than 150 employees during the first nine months of this year, many of them part of what it described as a systemwide realignment. Community spokeswoman Lynda de Widt described the staff reductions as part of the normal course of business in an organization that has 13,000 employees. Community reported in late November that it had spent $5 million this year on severance costs.
Because Indianapolis-area hospitals have let go a wave of workers this year, the University of Indianapolis will host a seminar to help nurses and health care professionals search for new jobs. The seminar, “Reinventing Yourself: A Personal Transformation for Healthcare Workers” is scheduled from 8:30 to 11:30 a.m. Jan. 11 in UIndy’s Schwitzer Student Center at 1400 E. Hanna Ave. The free event is sponsored by UIndy’s School for Adult Learning, School of Nursing and College of Health Sciences, and will tout UIndy’s health-related educational programs. Also, John Vice, a longtime human resources manager for Eli Lilly and Co., will tell attendees how to pursue new career paths.
Nearly 2,800 Hoosiers selected a private insurance plan on the Obamacare exchange in November, nearly four times as many as did so in October. The faster pace of enrollment was mirrored in the other 35 states that are also relying on the federally run Healthcare.gov web site for online enrollment. The Obama administration worked feverishly in November to correct major technical problems with the website that prevented numerous Americans from enrolling. Even so, the pace of enrollment in the federal exchange will need to be nearly 12 times faster than it was in November if enrollment via the exchange is going to meet a federal projection of more than 4.8 million enrollees by the end of March. According to a report issued Wednesday by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 137,204 actually selected a private health insurance plan during October and November, with about 110,000 of them doing so in November. In 14 states and the District of Columbia, which are operating their own insurance exchanges, enrollment also surged in November, to nearly 148,000 people, compared with about 80,000 in October. Enrollment via the state-based exchanges will need to triple its pace to meet an overall federal projection of 7 million enrollees via the Obamacare exchanges.
More than 10,000 low-income Indiana residents who participate in the Healthy Indiana Plan will be able to keep their benefits through April. The Indiana Family and Social Services Administration announced Dec. 10 it is extending for an extra three months its Healthy Indiana Plan to participants who earn between 100 percent and 200 percent of the federal poverty level. The move will give members more time to obtain coverage through the federal health care exchange. FSSA Secretary Debra Minott said many HIP members have struggled to enroll in the exchange because of technical issues. The HIP extension could cost Indiana up to $11 million.
Stephen Blaising said in a recent court filing that he will pay $125,000 to satisfy a lawsuit brought by the bankruptcy trustee representing investors in an Ohio company led by Tim Durham.
Attorneys for the Fair Finance trustee said Tim Durham's ex-wife, Joan SerVaas, has agreed to pay $100,000 and Bernard Durham, his adopted son, $10,000 to settle a lawsuit charging they accepted nearly $300,000 from the disgraced financier.
Eli Lilly and Co. has been counting on torrid growth in China to help offset losses from patent expirations in other markets, but now slower growth in the Chinese economy and bribery allegations against Lilly and two other drugmakers have hampered Lilly’s growth there.
I recently overheard two business leaders saying the slow pace of economic recovery would impede their quarterly results. I concur with their assessment, but focusing on the rate of economic recovery is similar to looking at an iceberg; only 10 percent is visible. The other 90 percent is hidden below the surface.
Shares of the consumer review service have dropped more than 12 percent since the company announced Monday that Chief Technology Officer Manu Thapar had departed. The firm recently hired a new chief financial officer.
The Metropolitan Development Commission voted Wednesday to cancel a tax abatement for Indianapolis-based tech staffing firm BCForward, since it didn’t hit job-creation targets laid out in a 2009 economic development agreement.
Indianapolis-based technology staffing company BCForward won’t fight a Department of Metropolitan Development move to discontinue tax breaks for the firm’s Market Street headquarters.
WellPoint Inc., the second-biggest U.S. health insurer, said more small employers are scaling back benefits this year, a potential hedge against higher costs expected under the U.S. health-care law.
Daniel Beckley, former executive director of the Charleston Symphony Orchestra, will take responsibility for the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra and the Hilbert Circle Theatre.
The attorney charged with recovering some $200 million for the 5,300 investors bilked by Tim Durham’s Fair Finance Co. plans to continue filing lawsuits for reparations into next year.
You certainly don’t want to keep paying a mortgage if it restricts your business in other areas. But you don’t want to cough up too much at once and have the same effect.
The biotech and technology companies could see their Marion County tax abatements reduced or cancelled if officials decide they didn’t fulfill promises on new investment and hiring.
Whenever a new report claims hospitals are charging too much, a stock set of defenses comes out. But hospitals are cutting prices and expenses as we speak, undermining those arguments.
