Stop removing prescription insurance coverage for state employees hired before July of 2011

Please, do not remove prescription coverage for retirees. Find another way to cut the budget that does not affect the health and wellbeing of your constituents.

Health insurance was a contract that the state made with me when I moved to Maryland to work at Frostburg State University. Do not break faith with state employees and voters who put you in office. Keep drug coverage for retirees.

I have been working at University of Maryland since 1996, and it is shocking to me that a retirement prescription drug benefit I will rely on in a few years would be removed, costing me thousands of dollars more each year. It will be hard enough to get by with my retirement savings, which on a professor's salary are nothing grandiose. Also, I have read that State passage of an ex post facto law is forbidden by the U.S. Constitution, and that no other state has retroactively rescinded a benefit committed to retirees. The cost of the Rx program is 0.2% of the State budget and has had no noticeable effect on State budgets. I strongly urge you to meet the commitment to employees who have served the State for decades. Thank you.

As an employee of UMD since 2001, I am devastated by the proposed legislation to remove prescription insurance coverage for retirees hired before July 2011. The change is a slap in the face to people that have committed their careers to state service. Killing the drug benefit undermines the trust and morale at the University and other state agencies. I urge our legislators to keep the drug benefit for retirees and keep the state's promise. It is the decent and ethical thing to do.

It's very concerning to learn that after working 40 years for the State of Maryland, I'm about to lose promised benefits as I'm nearing retirement. This establishes a precedent. Will retiree health benefits and pension be next?

Keep prescription coverage for all retirees.

The decision to potentially remove prescription insurance coverage for state employees after retirement is extremely upsetting. We are all counting on this coverage and hoping that you will reconsider.

PLEASE, I worked for the University of Maryland for over 46 years expecting to keep my prescription coverage. If I have to go on Medicare Part D, my monthly costs for my prescriptions will go from the current $41 to over $1100 a month! That is hard to afford on a state employee pension!

I oppose the removal of prescription insurance coverage for state employees

As a state employee who was employed before 2011, is still working for the state, It makes me angry that this benefit we were told we would have will be gone. I took a lesser paying job for the benefits that were offered to me by the state which made up for the lack of my salary. I believe that all employees that were hired before 2011 should receive the prescription plan that the state offered them when they were hired.

We earned these benefits, not fair to just take them away.

What is the rationale to penalize long-term employees hired before 2011? This seems to be an agist thing and is a bad look for Maryland. Please rethink this.

Please, do not remove prescription coverage for retirees. Find another way to cut the budget that does not affect the health and wellbeing of your constituents.

Retiree income is really low , and the older you get more medicines you need buy, this is not fair for retirees that devoted their life to the state service

I have worked for the University of MD since 10-11-1999, and am within a couple of years of retirement with a pre-existing condition requiring prescription medication. Please reconsider this ill-advised legislation.

I do not support the current plan to remove/change prescription insurance coverage for state retirees

I was hired at the University of Maryland in 1987 and have worked for the State for 47 years. I am depending on the prescription drug plan in my retirement. What else should we expect?

Please keep prescription drug coverage for retirees for the state of Maryland.

My wife and I were counting on the prescription drug benefit plan for our retirement.

I have been a University of Maryland professor for 26 years and urge the State not to remove the retirement prescription drug benefits that I have earned and have been counting on in my retirement planning.