Arizona could soon have less money to help people sign up for the Affordable Care Act.
Last week, the Trump administration announced it would cut the enrollment budget for navigators, the people who provide assistance to consumers buying plans on the marketplace.
That came as a surprise to Allen Gjersvig.
“We were told over and over again you are doing a great job. We don’t see any problems on the horizon,” said Gjersvig, head of Navigator & Enrollment services at the Arizona Alliance for Community Health Centers.
Gjersvig’s job is to distribute that federal money to more than a dozen community groups, which then encourage people to sign up during open enrollment.
Now the grant will be calculated differently — based on whether organizations reached their enrollment goals set last year, before the election
Gjersvig said he still doesn’t know “when we will find out what amount we will have available, what that amount is, the formula that was used to calculate it.”
The grant was supposed to have begun on Sept. 2, but it’s unclear whether the funding will be retroactive.
