UC could cut health care costs

Asked to make a snap judgment on this question - "Should theUniversity of California take over state prison health care?" - theresponsible, informed Californian would automatically answer, "No."

That's because job No. 1 for the university is to maintainacademic excellence during challenging budgetary times. In manyways, that's its only job.

We could argue over the best way to maintain that excellence. Forus, the best focus is clear: Start bureaucratic housecleaningimmediately, because a crazy level of administrative growth is aleading cause of UC overspending. A 2008 UCLA faculty study showedthat in the decade prior, the number of UC administrators almostdoubled. In that same year, 397 administrators were each paid over$200,000 annually. The total pay for the highest-compensateduniversity administrators almost doubled within just two years.

That kind of rampant uber-managerial growth is occurring just astuition is being hiked an astonishing 32 percent, faculty hiringdoesn't keep up with demand and our best professors are being wooedby the Ivy League, often successfully.

As one UC prof asks: "When's the last time anybody saw a rankingof universities based on the quality of their administrators?"

Slash administrative positions by half and put the money backonto campuses.

But that advice is easy to give. The issue at hand, raised afterefficiency-expert consultants recommended it, is whether theuniversity should somehow tackle prison health care.

Our first clue that it's not such a loopy idea comes through thebottom line: The study says the move could save the state $12billion in its first decade. That's the kind of real moneyCalifornia needs for reinvestment in places that matter - itsuniversities, for instance.

California pays more than $40 a day for health spending for eachinmate; Texas spends $9.67. Why? One reason is that we don't haveprison hospitals or even hospitals necessarily near prisons. When aninmate becomes an in-patient, we pay overtime to already highly paidprison guards to transport and watch over them in distant hospitals.

Under a proposal backed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, UC medicalschools would create a managed care system based on so-called"telemedicine," in which physicians and nurses see patients throughInternet connections, easing security concerns and costs. Recordswould finally go electronic. Some new hospitals would probably haveto be built near prisons, which would pay off over time because ofthe elimination of guard overtime.

Another reason the plan would save billions - some state jobswould be lost because of these efficiencies.

The University of California and prison health care? As oneuniversity health services administrator says, noting the system'srecent takeover of troubled Martin Luther King Jr. Hospital, it'snot such an odd fit.

"This is part of our mission and our responsibility," John Stobosaid. Could save us all some money, too.