Cairo insurance left in limbo; mayor, council blame each other

CAIRO, Ill. -- Health insurance coverage for city employees will be cut off April 1 unless the feuding council and mayor can agree on a plan to pay a $142,000 past-due bill.

Mayor Paul Farris called a special council meeting Tuesday to resolve the issue, but only two of six council members attended. The lack of enough members to do business left the insurance issue in limbo.

After the meeting, Farris and city attorney Alan McIntyre said the council is to blame for the looming cancellation of insurance coverage. The tax rate set last year wasn't sufficient to pay the past-due premiums, they said, leaving the city in the position of needing to borrow the money.

Council members included money in the budget to pay an attorney representing them in lawsuits, Farris said. "But they forgot about the working guys and girls."

Absent council members, interviewed by telephone, said Farris is to blame for the city's lack of funds to pay the bill because he ignored pleas to restrain spending in the past year.

The stalemate over whether to borrow enough to pay the premiums has gone on for more than a month, with Farris seeking council approval for a loan and the council refusing.

The Laborers Health and Welfare Fund sued the city in 2004 to recover past-due premiums. The fund won a federal court judgment against the city, and the council agreed early last year to borrow enough to pay half the bill.

The other half -- $136,000 plus more than $6,000 interest -- is due by March 31. And unless the council takes some step by then showing a plan to pay the bill, the insurance will be canceled April 1, said Ken Kepper, representative of the fund.

"I have spoken to a couple of them, and they said they understood the importance of it," Kepper said. "It is a little surprising to me today that they didn't do it."

'Hurting the workers'

The past-due premiums date to 2003 and 2004. The city's contract with the Laborers' International Union Local 773 requires the city to pay health insurance premiums for its workers.

"The workers have done everything that anybody has ever asked of them," Kepper said. "They are hurting the workers, and that is wrong."

Farris has negotiated a loan with Capaha Bank. The bank told the city that it must act this week if the payment deadline is to be met, McIntyre said.

Council members, however, said a letter from Capaha Bank detailing the terms of the loan also set some conditions. Cairo must have a recent audit and provide a list of outstanding loans and bank balances, said Bobby Whitaker, leader of the anti-Farris faction.

No city audits have been completed since 2002. An audit for the year ending April 30, 2003, is almost ready, Farris told the council at a recent meeting.

Council members don't trust Farris, Whitaker said. The only way Whitaker said he would consider voting for the loan is "if the bank is going to issue the checks in the name of the people it is going to go to."

The next round of the fight between Farris and the council will occur this morning in Alexander County court, when a judge will hear the small-claims lawsuit over council paychecks. Farris has refused to issue paychecks to four council members who in December called for a boycott of meetings. After missing one regular and one special meeting, the council members began attending regular meetings, but Farris has refused to give them their pay.

rkeller@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 126