Maryland Department of Health takes steps to stabilize workforce in the wake of ongoing Medicaid redeterminations.
According to The Baltimore Sun, the Maryland Department of Health (MDH) will be making a request to the Board of Public Works (BPW) next week to potentially convert 144 contractual positions to new regular positions. The standard procedure for the BPW to create additional positions currently requires the elimination of 1.25 full-time contractual positions for every new regular position established. As part of the MDH submission they have identified 180 contractual positions to eliminate as part of the request.
From the MDH request:
“Converting current contractual employees to permanent state merit positions will provide stability not offered by contractual employment and ultimately strengthen the state public health workforce that we are rebuilding.”
This change comes amidst a nationwide Medicaid redetermination process that began earlier this year, in line with the expiration of the federal COVID-19 emergency. As covered previously on the Conduit Street blog, Maryland and a number of states ran into trouble with disenrollments that happened because of procedural errors and automated processes that did not account for factors at work within a particular household.
