Local
Blue Cross resolves glitch in enrolling gay spouses
Md. activist’s wife listed as ‘male’ on insurance plan
Maryland activist Lisa Polyak encountered problems adding her wife, Gita Deane, to a Blue Cross insurance policy. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
It’s all been resolved. As of Saturday, July 19, federal employee Lisa Polyak, one of the leading activists pushing for Maryland’s marriage equality law, succeeded in adding her legally married spouse and partner of more than 30 years, Gita Deane, to her employee health insurance policy.
The approval came more than two weeks after Polyak’s request to add Deane to her health plan was denied, with a Blue Cross Blue Shield customer service representative informing her that a computer program used to process such requests would not accept same-sex spouses.
On July 20, Polyak, a civilian staff member with the Department of the Army in Aberdeen, Md., discovered to her delight that the quirky computer glitch that initially required Deane’s gender to be listed as “male” in order for her to be approved for Polyak’s health plan was changed to female.
“We have been overpaying for health insurance for so long – 30 years – that we would not have cared if they listed her as a kangaroo, as long as she was covered,” Polyak quipped to the Blade.
Polyak was referring to the fact that the couple had to pay for duplicate health insurance policies for years before states began legalizing marriage between same-sex couples. Once that happened in Maryland earlier this year she still couldn’t add Deane to her health plan because the Defense of Marriage Act, or DOMA, prohibited the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages.
That remaining impediment ended on June 26 when the U.S. Supreme Court declared DOMA unconstitutional.
Jena L. Estes, vice president of the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association’s Federal Employee program, said the snafu Polyak encountered represented the rare exception in the health insurance giant’s task of changing its internal procedures to enroll same-sex spouses of federal workers just days after the Supreme Court issued its landmark decision.
“As of today, we process probably about 40 requests a day and those are all being handled very successfully,” Estes said in describing how Blue Cross Blue Shield affiliate companies throughout the country are enrolling same-sex spouses into federal employees’ health insurance plans.
According to Estes, CareFirst, the Blue Cross Blue Shield company providing health insurance in the D.C. metropolitan area, has successfully processed about 100 requests by federal employees like Polyak to add their same-sex spouse to their health plan since July 3.
That’s when the U.S. Office of Personnel Management issued a special guidance directing health insurance companies that provide policies to federal employees to begin enrolling same-sex spouses under the federal health benefits program. The OPM guidance and directive allows federal employees to enroll their same-sex spouses for a 60-day period that ends on Aug. 26.
If they don’t arrange for a same-sex spouse to be enrolled by that date they must wait until Nov. 11, when the annual open enrollment period begins for the federal employee health insurance program. The open enrollment period lasts until Dec. 9.
Estes attributes the problem Polyak experienced to a short period in which some of the Blue Cross Blue Shield companies had yet to fully change their internal systems to adapt to the Supreme Court ruling. She noted that the OPM guidance called for the insurance companies to begin processing same-sex spouse enrollments in the federal employee system beginning July 3, just five business days after the Supreme Court decision.
“So once it came out we put protocols in place immediately and began working diligently to make sure that we could accommodate the requests,” Estes told the Blade in a telephone interview on Monday. “And I believe we’ve done that.”
But in Polyak’s case, those system changes apparently weren’t put in place by the CareFirst operation overseeing federal employee health plans where Polyak worked in Maryland.
“I spoke to Blue Cross Blue Shield reps on July 1, July 8, and July 15 and they told me that they had tried and failed to add Gita as my spouse on my insurance plan,” she told the Blade. “I also tried to add Gita as my spouse on the website. But when I identified Gita as a female…the website rejected my change and would not add her to the list of covered family members.”
Polyak said the Blue Cross Blue Shield customer service representatives were cordial and expressed frustration that they couldn’t immediately override the computer program. She said they couldn’t give her a date when the problem would be resolved.
On July 19, several days after the Blade began making inquiries about Polyak’s case with OPM and Blue Cross Blue Shield, she said a CareFirst official informed her that the computer program had been manually overridden and her request to include Deane on her policy was approved retroactively as of June 26. However, for the time being, Polyak said, the official told her Deane would have to be listed as a male.
That troubled Polyak because another company representative had told her that a medical claim filed by Deane’s doctor would be rejected if the claim identified her as female while the insurance policy listed her as male.
However, that problem was somehow resolved overnight, Polyak said. When she checked her insurance policy online on Saturday, July 20, Deane’s gender had been changed to female.
“That shows how quickly we respond,” Estes told the Blade. “But you know, we really have had maybe 15 days since OPM issued its guidance and a couple of those days were federal holidays. So we’ve been working really diligently and I’m really happy it happened in less than 24 hours,” she said in referring to Polyak’s case.
John O’Brien, Director of Healthcare and Insurance for OPM, said OPM has been working with health insurance companies to make sure same-sex couples obtain the benefits to which they are now entitled.
“If a carrier is having problems — computer or otherwise — with updating a federal employee’s enrollment status, the carrier has the responsibility to correct the issues immediately,” O’Brien told the Blade in an email. “In addition, both the carriers and enrollees should contact OPM if problems persist.”
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Congratulations to Jamie Leeds, chef extraordinaire, and owner of Hank’s Oyster Bars, as she ventures into some new areas. Leeds is an award-winning Washington, D.C.–area chef, restaurateur, and entrepreneur with more than three decades of experience shaping the region’s dining scene.
Her first new venture is a restaurant opening in Alexandria this week. It will be called Hank’s Pasta Bar, bringing a personalized twist to classic Italian dining with a hiddenrestaurant-inside-a-restaurant in Old Town, Alexandria. The new trattoria is above Hank’s Oyster Bar, and will feature a build-your-own menu, marking a new direction for Leeds in partnership with chef Darren Norris. Norris brings more than three decades of experience to Hank’s Pasta Bar, with a foundation grounded in Italian cooking. The grand opening was scheduled for May 14. The elevated casual eatery blends an inventive chef-driven menu with an easy-going, sit-down dining experience that puts guests in charge. Hank’s Pasta Bar bridges the gap between elevated fast casual, like Norris’s Shibuya, and full-service dining, like Leeds’s Hank’s Oyster Bar. Diners order electronically at the table, but unlike fast casuals, food and beverages are delivered on plate ware, and a server is on site at all times.
The restaurant-inside-a-restaurant, welcomes guests to dine in with a full bar, including Italian wines and craft cocktails, maintaining its focus on traditional Italian fare with contemporary touches, including a build-your-own pasta bowl experience starting at $16. Create your own pasta bowl from seven artisanal pastas (including gluten-free), nine made-in-house sauces, proteins, vegetables, and toppings. Leeds said, “It’s the kind of place you’d find down a side street in a Tuscan hill town, after being tipped off by a friend who says, ‘trust me.’ If you know, you know.”
The restaurant will continue Hank’s community partnerships, including with Real Food for Kids, supporting programs that improve school food and nutrition equity.
In addition to this you should try Jaimie’s other new venture. Back Door Taco at Hank’s in Dupont Circle. You walk down the alley from 17th Street to the back door of Hank’s, and enter a small patio to partake of great tacos and interesting cocktails.
District of Columbia
HIV Vaccine Awareness Day set for May 18
Whitman-Walker joins nationwide recognition of efforts to develop vaccine
Whitman-Walker Health, the D.C.-based community healthcare center that specializes in HIV/AIDS and LGBTQ-related health services, will join health care advocates from across the country to support efforts to develop an HIV vaccine on HIV Vaccine Awareness Day on May 18.
“HIV Awareness Day, observed annually on May 18, was established to recognize and thank the volunteers, scientists, health professionals, and community members working toward a safe and effective prevention HIV vaccine,” Whitman-Walker said in a statement.
“Led by the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), the day is also an opportunity to educate communities about the critical importance of preventive HIV vaccine research,” the statement says.
It adds, “The reality is that any new vaccine discovery must be built community by community, institution by institution, and then it must reach everyone – especially the communities who have carried the heaviest burden of this epidemic.”
On its own website, the National Institutes of Health says HIV Vaccine Awareness Day also highlights its longstanding efforts, coordinated by its Office of AIDS Research, to support researchers’ efforts to develop an HIV vaccine.
“Researchers are making promising headway in efforts to develop a safe, effective HIV vaccine,” it says in a statement on its website.
A Whitman-Walker spokesperson said Whitman-Walker was not holding a specific event to observe HIV Vaccine Awareness Day, but it will recognize the day as a way of encouragement for its ongoing work to address the AIDS epidemic and support for vaccine research.
“Today, no one has to die from HIV,” said Whitman-Walker’s Health System division’s CEO, Dr. Heather Aaron in the Whitman-Walker statement. “We have the treatments, the technology, and the research to change outcomes, and yet people in our community are still dying from HIV//AIDS,” she said in the statement.
“That is unacceptable, and it is exactly why our work continues,” she added. “Here in D.C. with more focus on Southeast D.C., the Whitman-Walker Health System remains committed to making a difference through cutting-edge research, policy advocacy, and philanthropy, because fair access to life-saving treatment is not a privilege. It is a right.”
District of Columbia
Capital Stonewall Democrats endorses Janeese Lewis George for D.C. mayor
Group also backed D.C. Council, Congressional delegate, AG candidates
The Capital Stonewall Democrats, D.C.’s largest local LGBTQ political organization, announced on May 14 that it has endorsed D.C. Councilmember Janeese Lewis George (D-Ward 4) for mayor in the city’s June 16 Democratic primary.
Lewis George along with former D.C. Councilmember Kenyan McDuffie (D-At-Large) are considered by political observers to be the two leading candidates among the seven candidates competing in the Democratic primary election for mayor.
Both have strong, long-standing records of support on LGBTQ issues, indicating Capital Stonewall Democrats members, like LGBTQ voters across the city, are likely choosing a candidate based on non-LGBTQ related issues.
In a May 14 statement, the group announced its endorsements in seven other Democratic primary races, including D.C. Council Chair Phil Mendelson, who is running unopposed in the primary. Also endorsed is D.C. Councilmember Robert White (D-At-Large), who is one of five Democratic candidates competing for the position of D.C. delegate to the U.S. House of Representatives.
D.C. Councilmember Brooke Pinto (D-Ward 2) is among the four candidates competing with White for that post, and who like White has a strong record of support on LGBTQ issues.
In the At-Large D.C. Council race for which incumbent Anita Bonds is not running for re-election, Capital Stonewall Democrats has endorsed community activist and LGBTQ ally Oye Owolewa in a nine candidate race.
For the Ward 1 D.C. Council election, in which five LGBTQ supportive candidates are competing, the group did not make an endorsement because none of the candidate received a required 60 percent of the endorsement vote cast by Capital Stonewall Democrats members, according to the group’s former president, Howard Garrett.
The statement announcing its endorsements shows that it decided to list its “Preferred Ranking” of each of the Ward 1 Democratic candidates as part of the city’s newly implemented ranked choice voting system. It lists gay candidate Miguel Trindade Deramo as first, bisexual candidate Aparna Raj second, Jackie Reyes Yanes third, Rashida Brown fourth, and Terry Lynch fifth.
In the remaining ward Council races, Capital Stonewall Democrats endorsed Councilmember Matt Fruman (D-Ward 3), who is running unopposed for re-election; Councilmember Zachary Parker (D-Ward 5), the Council’s only gay member who is being challenged by two opponents; and Councilmember Charles Allen (D-Ward 6), who is running unopposed for re-election.
The group also chose not to make an endorsement in the special election for another At-Large D.C. Council seat that became vacant when then-Independent Councilmember McDuffie resigned to enable him to run for mayor as a Democrat. Under the city’s Home Rule Charter adopted by Congress, that at large sweat is restricted to a “non-majority party” candidate, meaning a non-Democrat.
The three candidates running for the seat, all Independents, include incumbent Doni Crawford, who was appointed to the seat earlier this year; former D.C. Councilmember Elissa Silverman; and Jacque Patterson. All three have expressed support on LGBTQ related issues.
“The organization’s endorsement process included candidate questionnaires, public forums, and direct voting by active CSD members,” the statement announcing its endorsements says. “Each endorsement reflects the collective voice of 173 LGBTQ+ Democrats who voted in the process and are committed to building lasting political power in the District,” according to the statement. “Candidates that reached 60 percent support received the endorsement.”
Garrett, the group’s former president, acknowledged that with nearly all candidates running in D.C. elections expressing strong support for the LGBTQ community, many if not most of the group’s members most likely chose a candidate based on issues other than LGBTQ related issues.
He said he believes Lewis George, who he is supporting and is viewed as a progressive candidate who self-identifies as a Democratic Socialist, compared to McDuffie, who is viewed as a moderate Democrat, captured the group’s endorsement based on the view that she is the best person to lead the city going forward.
“I believe that Capital Stonewall members voted for Janeese Lewis George because we’re tired of the status quo and we need a new, bold leader to not only move our city forward but also to stand up to Donald Trump and his administration,” Garrett told the Washington Blade.
McDuffie’s LGBTQ supporters, including former Capital Stonewall Democrats presidents David Meadows and Kurt Vorndran, have argued that McDuffie’s positions on a wide range of issues, including LGBTQ issues, show him to be the best candidates to lead the city at this time and In future years.
The group’s endorsement of Lewis George comes one week after GLAA DC, a nonpartisan LGBTQ advocacy group, awarded her its highest candidate rating of +10.
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