King County health-care cuts: a dose of reality

THE lights finally flickered on at the Metropolitan King County Council, where at least two council members want to fix the county's overly generous and costly employee health-care plan.

The county's endless cycle of budget woes has several organic causes, and one is its deluxe health plan. Workers currently pay zero toward health-care premiums, an increasingly unheard of practice in both the public and private sectors.

Bob Ferguson and Dow Constantine propose an ordinance that requires employees earning more than the county mean income — about $60,000 — to pay a small part of monthly premiums.

If other council members agree, and they should, unaffiliated employees would contribute 2 percent of the amount by which their annual incomes exceed the county's mean income — roughly $33 a month for an individual earning $80,000 a year.

The proposal is meek, merely a start. It does not go far enough or represent a big enough budget reduction. If the plan works as envisioned, it would save only $1 million per year on health-care costs that ballooned from $158 million in 2005 to $214 million this year.

The county's overall budget gap was $93 million in 2009 and could be as high as $50 million in 2010. But this legislation is a start; both council members are congratulated. Their colleagues are strongly urged to support the legislation or expand on it.

Let's not kid ourselves. This is an election year with five candidates, including Constantine, running hard to replace outgoing executive Ron Sims. At least Constantine is willing to tackle a tough issue.

County employees enjoy some of the richest health benefits in the region, a luxury the county can no longer afford.

The rest of the council should support the proposal — or push to make the employee contribution more substantial. This is not an attempt to pick on one group of employees. It is a dose of economic reality.