Santa Barbara (Calif.) County administrators agreed to pay $28 million to settle complaints filed by the Department of Justice, including allegations of false billing and whistleblower retaliation, the Santa Barbara Independent reported Oct. 14.
The settlement includes $21.4 million for allegedly improper billing on behalf of low-income mental health patients that took place over 10 years, with $3 million going to whistleblower Judith Zissa, a former department employee, and another $3.6 million covering attorney's fees, the report said. The court filing describes a "revenue-first" culture in which physicians were pressured hard and rewarded to bill aggressively for treating low-income patients with mental illness issues.
The complaints allege that the high billing rates of these clients constituted about 90 percent of the patients the department treated each year, the report said. Employees were allegedly rewarded for exceeding billing targets, and "punished if they refused to cooperate in the excessive billing practices or turned a blind eye to questionable practices."