Imagine that I am a state employee of Utah who has been working in the same department for 10 years. Now imagine that I have a co-worker, Bob, who has worked in the cubicle next to me for six months. I am single with no dependents, and Bob is married with five children (not an unusual number in Utah).
Bob has elected to enroll in the State’s PEHP insurance benefits program, adding his wife and five children to the plan as dependents, while I have enrolled only myself. However, my handicapped sibling, mentally disabled son, or partner, just to give a few examples, also lives with me, is dependent upon my income, and needs health insurance which I cannot afford on my income.
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Even though I’ve been a state employee for a decade, I am not allowed to add them to my insurance despite the fact that they are financially dependent on me. On the other hand, even though Bob has only been working here for six months he is allowed to insure seven individuals.
While I do not begrudge Bob his access to the insurance benefits, as a state employee shouldn’t my dependents have access to the same benefits that Bob’s do? Isn’t that the purpose of a family insurance plan, to take care of our loved ones?
House Bill 64 is a common-sense bill which would give state employees more options and flexibility with their insurance benefits. If a state employee is not using his insurance benefits for a spouse, he would be allowed to use them for one adult designee who is at least 18 years of age, directly dependent or interdependent with the state employee, and resides in the same home as the employee for at least the past 12 months.
HB64 reflects the reality of our families in a world where we share our emotions, our finances and our homes with extended family members and partners.
It is unfortunate that in our hyper-political world, fear mongers have made claims that allowing an adult designee who also happens to be a same-sex partner would somehow violate Utah’s constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. This is a misrepresentation of a bill that could do enormous good for Utah families.
Utah District Court Judge Stephen Roth made a ruling on May 11, 2006, that, "the court is aware of no Utah law of general application to marriage that establishes health benefits as a perquisite of marriage." He goes on to say, "In their essence, employee health benefits are first and foremost simply a perquisite of employment."
Health insurance is a benefit earned by being a contributing employee. Why limit our state employees’ ability to choose how best to apply that benefit to their family? Legal arguments aside, wouldn’t it be the human thing to do to make sure that our families can be taken care of? Isn’t it one of the basic values of all of us who live in our beautiful state to show charity and kindness towards our fellow man? Isn’t this just common sense?
I hope that my colleagues in the Utah Legislature will rise above the fear mongers and lead Utah state employees toward more options, flexibility and availability of health insurance benefits. HB64 shows, if nothing else, that we in Utah will always show service towards one another, whether that be a sibling, mentally disabled son, or even a partner.
Brian Doughty is a member of the Utah House of Representatives. He represents District 30 in Salt Lake City and is the sponsor of HB64.
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