Scott Leitz, the second executive to run the state's MNsure health insurance exchange, is taking a job as a senior fellow in health care at NORC, a research center at the University of Chicago.
Leitz took the top job at MNsure in December 2013 as the exchange was in crisis mode. With the deadline for coverage closing in, thousands of people were waiting hours on hold for help from an overwhelmed MNsure call center because they couldn't get help from the exchange's balky website.
The situation had calmed considerably by the time Leitz left in May 2015 for a job with the Health Care Cost Institute, a nonprofit research group backed by the insurance industry.
Michael Davern, executive vice president of research and director of health care research at NORC, said in a statement: "We will benefit greatly from his extraordinary expertise in the design, implementation and oversight of health reform initiatives."
Before MNsure, Leitz as an assistant commissioner at the Minnesota Department of Human Services, overseeing the state's $10 billion Medicaid program. He was also an assistant commissioner at the Minnesota Department of Health, and worked for a time in public policy for Children's Hospitals & Clinics of Minnesota.
April Todd-Malmlov was the first executive director at MNsure. Currently, Allison O'Toole serves as chief executive at the health insurance exchange. MNsure and other government-run exchanges were launched in 2013 as part of the federal Affordable Care Act.
