Health Chairs Meeting
Medicaid Reform or Restructuring within the States:
Opportunities and Challenges
June 16-18, 2005
Washington, DC
Faculty Bios
Samantha Artiga
Gary Claxton
Kelly Furgeson
Eugene Gessow
John Goodman, Ph.D.
Jeanne Lambrew, Ph.D.
Jack A. Meyer, Ph.D.
Charles Milligan, J.D., M.P.H.
Dann Milne, Ph.D.
Charles E. Reed
Susan Reinhard, Ph.D.
Andy Schneider
Vernon Smith, Ph.D.
James R. Tallon, Jr.
Rita Vandivort-Warren, MSW
James M. Verdier
Samantha Artiga
Samantha Artiga is a Policy Analyst for the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured at the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. She is the lead analyst responsible for developing and executing the Commission’s work examining the impact of major changes states make to their Medicaid and SCHIP programs through waivers. She also serves as the primary analyst for work on immigrant health issues. Other focus areas include premium assistance, cost sharing, and coverage and access to care for low-income children, families, and adults. She has authored numerous reports focused on waivers, which provide detailed analysis of their design, discuss their policy implications, and assess their role in providing new coverage. Prior to joining the Commission, Ms. Artiga worked with the National Program Office of the Healthy Steps for Young Children Program, a program designed to help improve provision of health services to children between ages zero and three. In this role, she provided technical assistance to health care practices that were implementing the program and disseminated information on best practices. Ms. Artiga holds a Masters degree in Health Services Administration with a concentration in Health Policy and a Bachelor degree in Economics from George Washington University.
Gary Claxton
Gary Claxton is a Vice President and the Director of the Health Care Marketplace Project at the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. The Project provides information, research, and analysis about trends in the health care market and policy proposals that relate to health insurance reform and our changing health care system. Prior to joining the Foundation, Mr. Claxton worked as a senior researcher at the Institute for Health Care Research and Policy at Georgetown University, where his research focused on health insurance and health care financing. From March 1997 until January 2001, Mr. Claxton served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Health Policy at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, where he advised the Secretary on health policy issues including: improving access to health insurance, Medicare reform, administration of Medicaid, financing of prescription drugs, expanding patient rights, and health care privacy. Other previous positions include serving as a consultant for the Lewin Group, a special deputy in the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, an insurance analyst for the National Association of Insurance Commissioners, and a health policy analyst for the American Association of Retired Persons.
Kelly Furgeson
Kelly Furgeson is a native of Lubbock, Texas. She received her Bachelors degree from the University of California, Berkeley, and her M.S.C.R.P. from the University of Texas at Austin. Her graduate thesis was in the area of “low-birth weight” births in Hispanic women in Texas. Upon completion of her Master’s degree, she taught in the Geography department at a private university in the state of São Paulo, Brazil. She has been on staff at the Legislative Budget Board since 1993, working in the health and human services policy area. She is currently a Senior Analyst serving as a team lead in the area of Medicaid acute and long-term care caseload and budget forecasting. She has served as lead analyst in caseload forecasting as well as in costing projects relating to proposed legislation in the areas of the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), continuous eligibility proposals for children in Medicaid and CHIP, and various Medicaid waiver development and expansion proposals.
Eugene Gessow
Eugene Gessow is the Medicaid Director for the State of Iowa. Between 2000 and 2003, Gene served as the Director for the Bureau of Medical Services for the Maine Department of Human Services. Prior to that, he was the Deputy Secretary for Finance in the New Mexico Human Services Department and was Budget Director and a Senior Budget Analyst for the Massachusetts Division of Medical Assistance. Throughout his career, Gene worked in the areas of budget analysis, Family Independence Act (welfare reform), compensation reform and legislative commissions. Gene holds degrees in public administration, law and economics.
John Goodman, Ph.D.
Dr. John Goodman is President and Founder of the National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA), a Dallas-based nonprofit nonpartisan research organization dedicated to providing private-sector solutions to public policy problems.
The National Journal and The Wall Street Journal both have called Dr. Goodman the “Father of Health Savings Accounts (HSA's)” for his pioneering research in consumer-driven health care. Dr. Goodman originated the concept for HSAs in his landmark book, “Patient Power: Solving America’s Health Care Crisis.” He is the author of 7 other books, including “Economics of Public Policy,” a widely used college textbook.
Dr. Goodman has authored numerous editorials in The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Investor’s Business Daily, the Los Angeles Times, The Dallas Morning News, Houston Chronicle, the San Diego Union-Tribune, and other notable newspapers. He also is quoted frequently in The New York Times, National Journal, BNA, the Financial Times and the Washington Times. He has appeared on C-Span, CNNfn, MSNBC, CNBC, the News Hour with Jim Lehrer, and the Fox News Channel. He was a featured debater on William F. Buckley’s Firing Line, having appeared on a number of two-hour prime-time debates on the flat tax, welfare reform and Social Security privatization.
The author or co-author of more than 50 published studies on topics ranging from health policy and tax reform to school choice, Dr. Goodman also has an active speaking schedule and has addressed more than 100 different organizations on public policy issues. He regularly briefs Congress on economic policy issues and frequently testifies before congressional committees. Dr. Goodman testified about HSAs before the U.S. Senate’s Special Committee on Aging. While Governor of Texas, George W. Bush named Dr. Goodman to a Blue Ribbon Task Force on the uninsured in Texas.
A recipient of the prestigious Duncan Black award for the best scholarly article in public choice economics, Dr. Goodman has taught and done research at several universities, including Columbia, Stanford, Dartmouth, Southern Methodist University and the University of Dallas. He received his Ph.D. in Economics from Columbia University.
Jeanne Lambrew, Ph.D.
Dr. Jeanne Lambrew is an associate professor at George Washington University, where she teaches health policy analysis and conducts policy-relevant research. She has assisted with Medicare prescription drug legislation, various proposals to build on Medicaid and the State Children's Health Insurance Program, and a health reform plan recently announced by the Governor of Maine.
Dr. Lambrew worked on health policy at the White House from 1997 through 2001 as the program associate director for health at the Office of Management and Budget and as the senior health analyst at the National Economic Council. She helped coordinate health policy development, evaluated legislative proposals, and conducted and managed analyses and cost estimates with OMB, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Treasury Department, the Labor Department and other relevant agencies. She was the White House lead on drafting and implementing the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) and helped develop the President's Medicare reform plan, initiative on long-term care, and other health care proposals. She also worked at the Department of Health and Human Services during the 1993-1994 health reform efforts, and coordinated analyses of budget proposals in 1995. Prior to serving at the White House, Dr. Lambrew was an assistant professor of public policy at Georgetown University (1996). She is currently on UNC's Rural Health Advisory Committee and on the Advocacy Committee for Academy Health and is a research fellow at the Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research.
Dr. Lambrew received her Bachelors degree from Amherst College and her Master's and Ph.D. from the Department of Health Policy, School of Public Health at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Jack A. Meyer, Ph.D.
Dr. Jack A. Meyer is the Founder and President of the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI). ESRI specializes in studies aimed at enhancing the effectiveness of social programs, improving the way health care services are delivered and financed, and making quality health care accessible and affordable. Dr. Meyer is also a Visiting Fellow at the Brookings Institution.
General areas of recent and current work include evaluation of new models to reduce the number of uninsured nationwide, comparative analysis of major policy alternatives to cover the uninsured in California, Connecticut, Maryland, and Delaware, analysis of the ingredients of hospital quality and patient safety, evaluation of innovative health purchasing strategies developed by states, assessments of states’ programs to support employer-sponsored health coverage for lower-income workers, and review of promising models improving access to health services for vulnerable populations
Dr. Meyer’s recent publications include Hospital Quality: Ingredients for Success, prepared under a grant from the Commonwealth Fund; “Building on the Job-Based Health Care System: What Would It Take?” Health Affairs; Covering America: Real Remedies for the Uninsured, prepared under a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation; Assessing State Strategies for Health Coverage Expansion: Summary of Case Studies of Oregon, Rhode Island, New Jersey, and Georgia, prepared for the Commonwealth Fund; “Improving Men’s Health: Developing a Long-Term Strategy.” American Journal of Public Health; and Reaching Out: Successful Efforts to Provide Children and Families with Health Care, prepared for the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.
Charles Milligan, J.D., M.P.H.
Mr. Charles Milligan is the Executive Director of the Center for Health Program Development and Management Center at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC), which is a fifty-person health policy and research organization. The Center provides various analytic services to its clients, including the Maryland Medicaid program, other Maryland state and local governmental agencies, federal agencies, state agencies outside Maryland, foundations, and others. Before joining the Center, Mr. Milligan worked at The Lewin Group. He is a former state Medicaid and S-CHIP Director from the State of New Mexico.
Mr. Milligan holds an M.P.H. from the University of California at Berkeley, a J.D. from Harvard Law School, and a B.B.A. from the University of Notre Dame.
Dann Milne, Ph.D.
Dr. Dann Milne is a health policy consultant with over 20 years of experience in designing, developing, implementing, and managing new programs for the Colorado Medicaid program. He served for 10 years on the State Medicaid Director’s Association Technical Advisory Group on Long-Term Care to the Health Care Financing Administration. He is an adjunct faculty member at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center where he teaches health care economics.
Charles E. Reed
Charles E. Reed recently retired as Deputy Secretary of the Washington State Department of Social and Health Services (DSHS). DSHS is the umbrella agency for Medicaid and a wide variety of human services. For many years prior to becoming Deputy Secretary, Mr. Reed headed the department’s Aging and Adult Services Administration. In this capacity, he pioneered the development of a comprehensive long-term care system responsive to client choice. Washington State has been recognized nationally for expanding home and community care options, while controlling costs. Currently, over half the long-term care clients in Washington receive services in their own home. Throughout his career, Mr. Reed has served in leadership positions with a number of national organizations, including the National Academy of State Health Policy and the National Association of State Units on Aging. Mr. Reed now consults and volunteers with several state and national organizations, including the AARP. He was recently appointed by Governor Lock as Chair of the Washington State Home Care Quality Authority.
Susan Reinhard, Ph.D.
Dr. Susan C. Reinhard, R.N. (Ph. D., Rutgers, 1991), is the Co-Director of the Rutgers Center for State Health Policy, a policy research center founded to stimulate sound and creative state health policy in New Jersey and around the nation. She directs 2 national initiatives to provide policy analysis and technical support to states. As the Director of the Community Living Exchange Collaborative at Rutgers, she works with states across the country to design long term support systems that help people with disabilities of all ages live in their homes and communities. As the National Program Director for the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s “State Solutions” program, she leads an effort to help states enroll more low-income older adults and people with disabilities in the Medicare Savings Programs.
As the former Deputy Commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Health and Senior Services, Dr. Reinhard led the development of a single point of entry system for older adults (NJEASE), consolidated policy and funding for senior services into one state department, secured significant funding to initiate consumer direction in home care programs, spearheaded the Community Choice Counseling program to transition people out of nursing homes back into their communities, and directed the statewide pharmaceutical assistance program for seniors and people with disabilities.
Dr. Reinhard co-founded the Institute for the Future of Aging Services in Washington, D.C. and served as the Executive Director of the Center for Medicare Education. Her research and policy expertise includes consumer choice and control in health and supportive care, family caregiving, development of assisted living and other community-based care options, quality improvement in long-term care, health care workforce development and regulation, state pharmaceutical policy, and medication safety. Dr. Reinhard’s background includes clinical care, nursing education, research, policy development, and state governmental relations. She is a former faculty member at the Rutgers College of Nursing and is a fellow in the American Academy of Nursing.
Andy Schneider
Andy Schneider has over 30 years of experience with the Medicaid program – as a consultant, as a Congressional staffer, and as a public interest and legal services lawyer. Currently, Mr. Schneider is a Principal with Medicaid Policy, LLC, a consulting firm, which he founded in January 2000. Based in Washington, D.C., the firm specializes in Medicaid issues affecting state agencies, providers, managed care organizations, and program beneficiaries. Mr. Schneider is also an Adjunct Professor at the George Washington University School of Public Health & Health Services.
Mr. Schneider spent 17 years on Capitol Hill. From 1979 through 1994, he served as Counsel to the Subcommittee on Health and the Environment at the House Commerce Committee, then chaired by Henry Waxman (D-CA). Mr. Schneider’s primary responsibility was Medicaid, over which the Subcommittee had exclusive legislative jurisdiction in the House. In 1995 and 1996, he served as Policy Advisor for Medicaid to the House Democratic Policy Committee within the Office of Minority Leader Richard Gephardt (D-MO). During his tenure on the Hill, Mr. Schneider staffed Medicaid issues on 10 Budget Reconciliation acts, the 1988 Medicare Catastrophic legislation, and the 1991 Medicaid Provider Donations and Taxes legislation.
Vernon Smith, Ph.D.
Dr. Vernon Smith is a Principal with Health Management Associates (HMA). He conducts research on economic, health care and public policy trends and their impacts on Medicaid, managed care, long-term care and other state health care programs. He has authored reports on the effects of the economic downturn on Medicaid, Medicaid and SCHIP enrollment trends, the impact of welfare reform on Medicaid, the use of Medicaid as a source of financing in state health programs, and exemplary practices in Medicaid primary care case management programs. He has spoken on these issues before many national and state audiences, including testimonies before committees of the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives.
Prior to joining HMA, Dr. Smith was the Michigan Medicaid Director. He also served as budget director of the human services agency and managed welfare and Medicaid budgets for the Governor's budget office in Michigan.
Dr. Smith holds a Ph.D. degree in Economics from Michigan State University. In recent years, he has held academic appointments in health care and public administration, including Adjunct Professor in Health Services Administration at Michigan State University and Adjunct Associate Professor in Public Administration at Western Michigan University.
James R. Tallon, Jr.
James R. Tallon, Jr. is the Chairman of the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured. Mr. Tallon is President of the United Hospital Fund of New York, the nation's oldest federated charity. The Fund addresses critical issues affecting hospitals and health care in New York City through health services research and policy analysis, education and information activities, and grantmaking and voluntarism.
Mr. Tallon served as chair of the Kaiser Commission on the Future of Medicaid and is a member of the Joint Commission on the Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO). He also serves as Secretary at the Alpha Center and the Association for Health Services Research, and is on the boards of the Alliance for Health Reform, The Commonwealth Fund, the New York Academy of Medicine, and the New York State Board of Regents. He recently concluded a 3-year term as a member of the Prospective Payment Assessment Commission (ProPAC), and has held visiting lecturer appointments at Columbia University and Harvard University Schools of Public Health.
Prior to joining the Fund in 1993, Mr. Tallon served in the New York State Assembly for 19 years. As Majority Leader from 1987 to 1993, and as Chair of the health committee from 1979 to 1987, he spearheaded efforts to reform the Medicaid program while expanding eligibility for pregnant women and children. In 1998, Mr. Tallon led the planning process to establish the National Quality Forum.
Mr. Tallon received his Bachelor’s degree in Political Science from Syracuse University and a Masters degree in International Relations from Boston University. He has done additional graduate work at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. In 1995, he was awarded honorary doctorates of humane letters from the College of Medicine and School of Graduate Studies of the State University of New York Health Science Center at Brooklyn and at New York Medical College. In March 2000 he was named an honorary fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives.
Rita Vandivort-Warren, MSW
Rita Vandivort-Warren is a Public Health Analyst on financing services and a government project officer in the Organization and Financing Branch, Division of Services Improvement, Center for Substance Abuse Treatment (CSAT), Substance Abuse, and Mental Health Services Administration.
She has over 20 years experience in mental health, substance abuse and health administration, program development and policy formulation. She is the CSAT lead on financing of substance abuse treatment services, and leads a number of projects, including Spending Estimates Project, integrating state cross system databases (Medicaid and State SA and MH agencies), blending funding for children’s mental health and substance abused services, financing strategies expert to grantees and other projects to analyze the public and private financing for substance abuse services. Dr. Vandivort-Warren currently manages, among other federal projects, the Spending Estimates Project, which determines the total national expenditures on mental health and substance abuse services from all public and private sources.
Dr. Vandivort-Warren worked at the National Association of Social Workers for over 8 years, crafting responses, through speeches, papers and acting in coalitions, on social work policy and practice in the areas of managed care, mental health and substance abuse, Medicaid and other public systems, behavioral health care best practices and telehealth. In Hawaii, Dr. Vandivort-Warren worked at the Queen's Medical Center in Honolulu for 10 years, which first created a foster family for elderly program funded under foundations and Medicaid waivers. Later she was Ambulatory Psychiatric Services Manager, directing an interdisciplinary mental health clinic, a psychiatric partial hospitalization program, and an outpatient step-down substance abuse treatment program
Dr. Vandivort-Warren has published and presented extensively on financing of mental health and substance abuse services from public and private payers.
James M. Verdier
Jim Verdier is a Senior Fellow at Mathematica Policy Research, Inc. in Washington, D.C., where his work focuses on Medicaid, state health policy, and Medicare. He is also a senior program consultant for the Center for Health Care Strategies (CHCS) and the CHCS Purchasing Institute, a foundation-funded initiative to help states develop, purchase, and improve managed health care programs. He is a visiting lecturer in public and international affairs at the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University, where he co-teaches a course on state health policy. He was the Indiana state Medicaid Director from 1991-97, and Deputy Director of the Michigan Department of Management and Budget from 1989-90. He taught public management and policy analysis at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard from 1983-89, and headed the Congressional Budget Office’s Tax Analysis Division from 1979-83. He served as a legislative assistant in the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate from 1968-75. He is a graduate of Dartmouth College and Harvard Law School.
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