Gina Raimondo - Secretary of Commerce
...an American politician and venture capitalist...
Raimondo acted as senior vice president for fund development at the Manhattan offices of Village Ventures, a venture capital firm based in Williamstown, Massachusetts, and backed by Bain Capital and Highland Capital Groups. Raimondo returned to Rhode Island in 2000 to co-found the state's first venture capital firm, Point Judith Capital. Point Judith subsequently relocated its offices to Boston, Massachusetts. At Point Judith, Raimondo served as a general partner covering health care investments; she retains some executive duties with the firm.
...as general treasurer of Rhode Island...
In May 2011, Raimondo released "Truth in Numbers", a report that advocated for benefit cuts as the solution to Rhode Island's pension problems, and she helped lead the effort to cut pensions...
Under Raimondo's tenure, the pension fund was criticized for underperforming when compared with its peers. Raimondo's critics attributed the underperformance to a sharp increase in fees paid to hedge fund managers...
...governor of Rhode Island...
Raimondo has cut taxes every year and removed 8,000 pages of regulations — 30 percent of the state's regulations.
State Health and Human Services computer system failure
A widely-criticized rollout of a new computer network system for the Rhode Island Executive Office of Health and Human Services dubbed the "Unified Health Infrastructure Project" (UHIP) in September 2016 saw scores of people without access to government programs such as food stamps and child care due to glitches in the software, designed by Deloitte. This computer crash created a backlog of over 20,000 cases.
The Raimondo Administration received several letters from the federal government in August and September 2016 warning that UHIP was not ready to be launched. On the orders of Raimondo, the UHIP launch occurred as planned despite these federal warnings. The U.S. Food and Nutrition Service's Northeast Regional Administrator, Kurt Messner, urged Raimondo to postpone the launch because it would interrupt or interfere with benefits that the agency oversees. Messner said in the letter which local news outlets described as "strongly-worded" that "The transition plan remains inadequate and unacceptable." Messner also pointed out that the state had failed to gradually launch UHIP in phases or administer a live pilot test of UHIP. Messner opined that "Launching a system without having conducted a live pilot is against the intent of the regulations and against our best advice." The Raimondo Administration ultimately ignored the federal warnings resulting in benefit delays, system downtime, and benefit loss caused in error.
December 2016 saw the federal government give the state Department of Human Services less than a month to fix the UHIP computer system or risk losing $13 million in federal funding. Federal officials judged that the state was not compliant in lowering a significant case backlog, starting a sufficient call-center, adequate staff training, and improving wait times at Health and Human Services field offices.
In February 2017, Executive Secretary of Health and Human Services Elizabeth H. Roberts resigned from her cabinet post in the Raimondo Administration due to the failed roll-out of the UHIP.
In March 2017 Rhode Island Monthly reported that the U.S. Department of Justice opened an investigation into UHIP, specifically false claims and statements made about the Health and Human Services computer network rollout. The investigation was still underway as of summer 2017. In an interview, House Oversight Chair Rep. Patricia Serpa (D-West Warwick) said, "There’s plenty of blame to go around. The auditor’s report found that [the contract with Deloitte] was poorly written, poorly overseen and poorly executed. They were warned against the implementation because the system was not ready. Not only did they implement it, they displaced all of the most senior workers with the wealth of experience. We pulled all the plugs to make sure this was a failure."
According to documents submitted to the federal government, the cost estimate for UHIP through 2021 is $656 million. State taxpayers will pay $154 million of this amount while the federal government will pay the remainder.
In January 2020 State Senator Sam Bell said that a Rhode Island Senate Fiscal Report on Raimondo's budget proved that "a single UHIP update kicked 5,500 Rhode Islanders off their Medicaid" in November 2019 without due process and the decisions were based on a computer update. Bell went on to say that "Medicaid terminations need to be done with some due process. They should not come from a notoriously glitchy computer system. You should have a chance to fight the decision to rip away your health insurance. When you lose your Medicaid with no warning and no effort to transition you onto the exchange, the consequences can be deadly."
RI DCYF fatalities and near-fatalities
Under Governor Raimondo, the Rhode Island Department of Children, Youth & Families has come under fire due to its relatively high rate of deaths and near-deaths of children in its care. In a period between January 2016 and December 2017, there were 31 fatalities or near fatalities of children in its care, with eight being confirmed fatal.
Raimondo appointed Trista Piccola as her new DCYF director in January 2017. Piccola's term was marked by the death and near-deaths of children, high staff turn-over rates, votes of no confidence, and high budget deficits. Rep. Patricia Serpa and Rep. Charlene Lima called for the resignation of Piccola, which finally occurred in July 2019.
In October 2018, the United States Department of Health and Human Services' Administration for Children and Families ordered the Raimondo Administration DCYF to improve in 33 of 36 areas assessed. The federal report noted that DCYF services were "inadequate, not developed when needed, or lacked consistent monitoring." Harvard Kennedy School professor and former Obama Administration official Jeffrey Liebman agreed with the recommendations and analysis of the report from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and claimed that the DCYF is "the most messed-up agency ever."
Between assuming office and the end of 2019, Raimondo consistently ranked in the bottom four approval ratings for all governors in the United States.
In early February 2020, Raimondo appeared alongside former Republican New York City Mayor and Democratic presidential hopeful Mike Bloomberg at the Wexford Innovation Center in Providence to endorse his candidacy, a move she described as “an easy call.” Raimondo was named a national co-chair for the Bloomberg campaign.
She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations
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