BOISE, Idaho (AP) — The board overseeing Idaho's health insurance exchange plans a 3-hour, 40-minute meeting behind a downtown Boise law office's closed doors where citizens will be barred Thursday — nearly twice as long as a public meeting scheduled later that day.
When the 2013 Legislature approved the exchange in April, it made clear it wanted open meetings. Lawmakers who wrote the statute creating this online insurance marketplace under President Barack Obama's health care overhaul said "every reasonable effort shall be made to make such meetings televised or streamed."
With so many Republicans against it — 29 in the Idaho House alone opposed it — making it as transparent as possible would help establish public trust and boost success, went the rationale.
But exchange chairman Stephen Weeg of Pocatello said Thursday's closed session will allow frank exchanges between board members and private attorneys about protecting the exchange's intellectual property from those who might exploit it, and to discuss risks facing board members between now and Oct. 1, when the exchange begins enrolling participants.
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