The City of Jefferson will continue with its current health insurance provider for 2019.

The City Council recently approved insurance premiums with Wellmark with an 18.95-percent increase. For the last three years, the City has had an increase in health insurance premiums of less than ten-percent. The main driving factor for such a high increase for next year was due to the City having double the amount of claims. City Administrator Mike Palmer explains where the money comes from to pay for the insurance premiums.

“Unfortunately that does come out of taxes because that’s the only place to get health insurance premiums from that’s allowed by law is through a tax asking. It’s not any new tax or anything, it’s just that the increase naturally can be asked for by the City through taxes.”

The City’s third party broker, Paradigm Benefits, received bids from other providers such as United Health Care, Coventry and Health Alliance, and Wellmark was the most favorable.