Center for Open Government: SB6 filed in response to consultant's problematic role in MCO bids.
Sen. Max Wise spoke on the floor of the Kentucky State Senate yesterday about legislation that would apply the Executive Branch Ethics Code to members of future gubernatorial transitions.
Wise referenced Emily Parento’s prominent role on Gov. Andy Beshear’s transition team and her subsequent involvement with Molina Healthcare’s bid for part of the state’s $8 billion medicaid managed care business. The Beshear administration cancelled the contract awards shortly after taking office, rebid them and ended up awarding the contracts to the same companies that secured the contracts through the original procurement.
Through the use of Kentucky’s open records statutes, the Center for Open Government uncovered a variety of problems related to Parento’s role:
(the) first proposal submitted by Molina Healthcare in response to Kentucky's $8 billion solicitation for Medicaid managed care organizations (MCOs) reveals consultant Emily Parento was retained by Molina only after Andy Beshear was elected Governor and had appointed Parento to his health care transition team.
Our review of Molina's first proposal did not find any mention of Parento as part of the their team. This contrasts with Molina's second bid that highlighted Parento as an important part of their Kentucky strategy.
In an earlier post we posed two questions:
If Parento's expertise created real value for Molina to position itself favorably to win the state's business wouldn't they have engaged her services for the first bid?
Or was she brought on - and highlighted in their proposal - more for her connections to a new administration than whatever value she will contribute to the delivery of Medicaid services to Kentuckians?
Parento was a high-level political appointee under former-Gov. Steve Beshear. She and her husband are longtime contributors to Andy Beshear’s campaigns:
Kentucky Registry of Election Finance's online records show Parento and her husband have been generous contributors to Gov. Andy Beshear through the years, contributing nearly $10,000 to his election efforts since 2014.Parento maxed out to Beshear's 2019 gubernatorial campaign with $2,000 contributions for both the primary and general election. David Parento contributed $3,500 for Beshear's 2019 race to unseat former Governor Matt Bevin.
No question greater oversight is needed of the relationships and opportunities that develop from serving on a Governor’s transition team. Sen. Wise’s SB6 is the right place to start.