City Wins Wellness Award, Taxpayers Win Savings

The city of Enumclaw has been recognized with a WellCity Award from the Association of Washington Cities (AWC) Employee Benefit Trust, according to an AWC press release issued last week.

Enumclaw was just one of 82 Washington cities to receive this award, which is based on meeting stringent best practice standards in promoting employee health.

Award recipients receive a 2 percent premium discount on their Regence BlueShield medical coverage for employees and spouses in 2012.
"While the 2 percent premium discount is a considerable motivation in times of strained budgets, the rewards go beyond the monetary savings," said AWC CEO Mike McCarty. "A city that works on employee health sees increases in productivity, morale and employee retention, and decreases in absenteeism and injuries."

Enumclaw Mayor Liz Reynolds said the award represented a 'win' situation on multiple fronts. The 2 percent discount, based on the current employee roster, represents a city monthly savings of $2,700 and an annual savings of $32,400, she said. "We continue to work on saving taxpayer dollars wherever we are able to and our wellness program is one avenue to do so," Reynolds said.

"It is a very big win-win," she said. It's a win for improved employee health. It's a win in that healthy employees equates to better job performances; and it's a win for the taxpayers in terms of cost savings, she said.

One of the best practices that AWC recognized in promoting employee health was the city's own wellness program, which was established in 2006 and continues to motivate employees to take better care of their health through a variety of incentives including monthly wellness events, said the city's recreation manager Michelle Larson.

So far in 2011, employees have already heard from Reynolds, who was , as she was the featured presenter in February discussing healthy lunch options. There are also on-site health checks planned with AWC. Data collected from these health checks helps AWC determine if they will provide the city with a $500 mini-grant to further promote health coach services, Larson said.

On average, about 30 employees attend these monthly events, and that represents about 25 percent of all city staff, Larson said. 

"It’s challenging to get creative ...  in order to get staff to come to our wellness programs," she said. "We do what we can to offer incentives such as free lunch, door prizes, as well as making it fun.  To date, my favorite event was 'Easy at-home Fitness' where we set up a Wii and Kinect and got people out moving on the Wii Fit, Wii Sports, and Kinect Dance Party.  It was a blast."

The city also offers another incentive called Health Connect which involves employees using punch cards whenever they do something healthy like attend a wellness event, swim at the , play at the , get a health check or sign up for a Parks & Rec activity, Larson said. Once they collect 10 punches, the card is entered into a drawing at the end of the year for a Kinect video game system for Xbox 360.

Employees can turn in as many punch cards as they'd like -- the more they enter, the better their chances of winning, she said.

Similarly, Enumclaw also partners with the and to offer employees special discounts, Larson said.

Enumclaw's wellness program had, until this year, been funded through matching grant dollars from AWC in the amount of $1,000 annually, Larson said. The city each year has then matched that amount. This year, however, the AWC changed things up and rather than offer the $1,000 grant through an application process, they provided the 2 percent medical premium discount as incentive for cities to apply for the WellCity award instead. 

Enumclaw has received the WellCity award since 2006, Larson said, but there wasn't a monetary incentive behind it until this year. Additionally, this year, "the criteria has become more stringent, and the application process more time-consuming. But it's definitely worth it to save the city and taxpayers money," she said.

The application process outlined a possible 197 points each city can earn based on nine different standards. At minimum, 90 points must be earned in order to receive the award -- Enumclaw's program rated a 143, said Larson.

Additionally, the wellness program must encompass either awareness, motivation, cultural support or behavior change all the while supporting Enumclaw employees in combating the top three health risks identified from the AWC employee annual health check: stress, depression and weight.

Larson couldn't provide hard numbers to illustrate how the wellness program has benefitted city employees, but she's come across enough anecdotal testimonials to believe this is a vital program. "Generally speaking, there is an increase in productivity and less absenteeism," she said.

She recalls one employee had started on the wellness program and progressively has lost 60 pounds. "I'd consider that a success," she said.

AWC’s Employee Benefit Trust provides health benefits to more than 15,000 city employees in Washington.

To learn more about the city's wellness program, contact Michelle Larson at MLarson@ci.enumclaw.wa.us.