CEO Weekly Update 25 April

Dear Colleagues,

I hope everyone had a wonderful week. Spring means beautiful weather, but it also means we are approaching the end of this legislative session, which will conclude on May 6. Just as a reminder, in odd‑numbered years (e.g., 2025, 2027) the legislature has "long sessions," which span from January to early June. These long sessions include debating and passing of the biennial state budget. However for even-numbered years (e.g., 2026, 2028) like this year, the legislature holds "short sessions," which begin February and end early May. During this session there is no new two-year budget but there will likely be plenty of policy and budget-adjustment bills.

Over the last few weeks President Radenka Maric and I, along with Jeff Geoghegan (UConn Health CFO), Reka Wrynn (UConn interim VP of Finance), Joann Lombardo (UConn senior director of government relations), Marie Schweitzer (UConn Health director of government relations) and Gail Garber (UConn director of government relations) and others have met with multiple legislators in person both at the Capitol and virtually. Actually, this week Marie Schweitzer gave a legislative update at my senior team meeting and I was surprised to see that we have made 52 in-person and virtual meetings, with 10 more to go. You're probably wondering what we request of legislators during these meetings. For UConn Health, it is a straightforward request: funding for the negotiated collective bargaining wage increases.

Specifically for UConn Health we anticipate the negotiated collective bargaining wage increases will total across two years (FY 2026 and FY 2027) an incremental $55.7 million that is not currently funded in our budget. Just to be clear, we believe our hard-working employees deserve raises. We are simply requesting that, like other agencies, we should receive funding for such increases.

Our main point to legislators is that we have already covered an over $50 million reduction in state funding this year (remember the $46.7 million Project Thrive). As good stewards and because of our pledge to eliminate state support for the clinical enterprise we have embraced that difficult challenge. However an additional $55.7 million was not included in our budget projections.

I want to pause here and thank our Government Relations team for their amazing work with the legislature. It is because of the relationships that Joann, Marie and Gail have cultivated over many years that President Maric and I are able to effectively advocate for the University and UConn Health.

Still on the topic of funding, we and the UConn Foundation have been working on an ambitious plan to raise $50 million a year in philanthropy for UConn Health by 2030. The trajectory starts with a goal to raise $19 million this year, which is considerably more than the $10 million we raised last year and the $8 million we raised the year before. Daniel Sullivan, senior associate VP for development presented an update this week and so far we are on track to reach the $19 million. My sincere thanks to Daniel, who this week celebrated his first six months at UConn/UConn Health. I can honestly say he and his UConn Health fundraising team including Sarah Pandoursky, Kim Barkhamer, Jennifer Hoyord, Liz Krueger, Kendall Guarneri, Marissa Bedini, Samantha Armstrong, Kristina Bennett, Pinar Ozyigit, and Sue Eselby as well as UConn Foundation President & CEO Amy Yancey and the rest of the UConn Foundation are revolutionizing how we raise funds at UConn Health.

And related to philanthropy, I'd like to thank all of you who participated in UConn Gives 2026 and for showing what's possible when the Husky community comes together. Your generosity helped turn two days of excitement into real, meaningful impact for UConn Gives. We'll be sharing our official results soon and can't wait to celebrate the full impact together, but in the meantime, we are deeply grateful for your support and belief in UConn. Thank you for showing up, giving back, and being an essential part of the Husky family.

Now for an update on our negotiations with Cigna. We have been working in good faith to reach a new agreement that appropriately reflects the cost of delivering high-quality care to our patients and community. As of this writing, we have not been able to come to an agreement on a fair and sustainable contract.

Without an agreement we will be out of network with Cigna effective May 1. That would include both our hospital and outpatient clinics, although behavioral health services will still be covered through Evernorth for Cigna members.

Our priority of course remains ensuring patients have access to the care they need, and we are actively communicating with patients about their options, including continuity of care where applicable. In the meantime, we remain engaged in discussions and will continue to negotiate in good faith toward a sustainable, long-term agreement.

As I mentioned last week, as of April 15, Solnit hospital is now part of JDH and it was heartwarming to see that they now participate in our morning safety huddle (in case your not familiar with safety huddles, this is a core practice in high-reliability hospitals and consists of a 30 minute structured daily meeting focused on patient safety risks and operational awareness). Going forward, our meetings with the Department of Children and Families (DCF), Solnit, and the Office of Policy and Management (OPM) are evolving from ensuring a seamless transition of the bed licenses to understanding how we can together enhance care.

I'd like to share a letter - actually two letters - from a woman describing the compassionate care her sister-in-law experienced on our oncology floor. The first is to Caryl Ryan, our CNO and hospital COO; the second is to staff nurse Gabby Ray (edited for length and privacy):