Linda Pepin presents herself as a volunteer who receives no compensation from the state. But NHPR has learned that she shared in broker's fees paid under the state health insurance program. Until recently, those fees totaled over $15,000 a month.
NHPR's Josh Rogers has more.
NHPR's series on Linda Pepin and the Choicelinx contract earned a 2004 Sigma Delta Chi Award for Radio Investigative Reporting from the Society of Professional Journalists.
In the past, Governor Craig Benson has compared his "volunteers" to people who pitch in at soup kitchens. But when asked last week if his special healthcare advisor Linda Pepin has reaped financial benefit from her volunteer endeavors Benson hedged a bit.
"I have no idea, She doesn't get any money from the state."
"Does she get any money from you personally?"
"No."
"None?"
"None."
That is not to say, however, that Linda Pepin has gone unpaid for her toils on behalf of New Hampshire taxpayers. At least through this September, Linda Pepin was a paid consultant to the state's insurance broker, Dennis French. It's French's job to advise the state on coverage issues regarding its employees, and to act as middleman between state employees and the carriers chosen to fulfill health and dental benefits. Dennis French would not say exactly how much Linda Pepin received for her work, but he admits she got a piece of his monthly compensation.
"In this case it was percentages."
"Percentages of what?"
"Commissions that come in. That's probably the most typical way of doing it. Let's say if I split the case with another broker, which is common, you know, we'll agree to a 50/50 or 60/40 split. It depends upon who's going to be doing what."
People familiar with the state's health insurance contract say the carrier at that time, Anthem, dealt almost exclusively with Linda Pepin. The fees associated with that contract totaled more 15 thousand dollars a month. But of equal importance is how Dennis French got in the position to collect those fees in the first place. The state can choose anyone who holds a valid brokers license to be its broker. The man who chose Dennis French was Joe D'Alessandro, the state's personnel director. As French tells it, Linda Pepin was the person who introduced him to Joe D'Alessandro, who also happens to be Pepin's former business partner.
"I met Joe through Linda and we were discussing how the state contract worked and whatnot, and I just began talking about how I work with different clients, and it just made a lot of sense."
Upon becoming the state's broker of record, it apparently also made sense for Dennis French to hire Linda Pepin to consult on coverage issues.
Dennis French received broker's fees on that Anthem contract until October, when last year's agreement ran out. But a separate dental program continues to pay French and Pepin --at least for a few more days. Following an earlier NHPR report on Pepin and Choicelinx, the state sent French a letter telling him that all brokerage fees would end as of December 1st.
For NHPR News, I'm Josh Rogers.
