By KERI CHAMPION

Staff Reporter

RESERVE-Employees of the St. John school system may be covered under a new health care plan for next year. The St. John Parish School System has received bids from several health care providers after requests for proposals for a new health care plan was announced by the school system publicly last week.

The decision to request a new health care group plan came after United Health Care was proposing a 27.3% health care rate increase that would have cost the system an additional $1.5 million for health care coverage.

There was concern from the administration that a large increase in health care coverage would put the system in a bind and jeopardize teacher raises.

Four companies submitted proposals to the board during the three-day process of accepting bids from Monday through Wednesday.

Felix Boughton, comptroller for St. John Schools said that United Health Care submitted a revised plan that decreased the increase in rates by a small percentage, but that it does not appear to compare with other companies seeking the bid.

Other companies who responded to the request for bid proposals were People’s Health, Humana and Blue Cross.

Boughton said that he is still analyzing the bids in consideration of which company will be granted the bid contract.

&#8220We feel good that we will be getting a better rate after requesting bid proposals. I feel confident that we could see a rate increase of 10 percent or less after accepting the proposals,” said Boughton.