“We’re pretty excited about it” said Mr. Esquivel, the district’s health insurance broker.
At a 3 November, 2025 special board meeting district trustees were informed their new level funded, self-funded, three-year rate guarantee health insurance plan includes a risk transfer strategy they didn’t know they had at a cost they didn’t know they approved.
The scheme transfers high risk plan members to individual health insurance policies.
“It’s becoming very popular now” said Carey Malek, Director of Marketing for ESC-100.“We use that to manage claims. By taking those claims out saves money for the plan.”
“Do you know who is the underlying carrier for this Cares program? asked a trustee. “Yes, it’s Gerber Life” said the ESC100 representative.
A school district official explained the district will save $700,000 with the ESC100 health plan. “That’s why they were able to offer such low premiums because they offered this as an edge against the employees who have higher claims.”
Kingsville ISD was previously insured by Aetna. Accrued reserves to cover runout claims are approximately $211,000. The estimated annual cost of the ESC100 program is approximately $2.7 million.
Patient dumping is becoming common. More brokers, TPAs and consultants are quietly promoting the scheme with focused efforts to fly under the radar. The ACA police are nowhere to be found to enforce something they can’t. Such is the unintended consequences of the ACA, legislation which Nancy Pelosi once famously said “We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it.”
