Karen Reinertson, a former lobbyist and executive director of the Colorado Department of Health Care Policy and Financing, died Sunday at her home in Austin, Texas. She was 70.
Reinertson, a budget director for Gov. Roy Romer, was in 2001 under Gov. Bill Owens.
Early in her career, Reinertson, a University of Wyoming graduate, lobbied on behalf of the city of Denver and Colorado Counties Inc., among others entities.
“She was involved in the thorniest local issues as a lobbyist,” said Republican political consultant Dick Wadhams, a longtime friend and colleague. “She was able to take very complex local and state issues and make sense of them.”
Reinertson was director of Romer’s Office of State Planning and Budgeting from 1990 to 1994. An Adams County Democrat, she received a bipartisan standing ovation from the House of Representatives when introduced as HCPF chief.
“Governors with both parties implicitly trusted her with huge amounts of responsibilities,” Wadhams said. “Karen was a consummate professional. She was driven more by hard numbers than she was any (political) ideological streak.”
Reinertson’s tenure as head of HCPF involved a bumpy computer systems crossover. The Colorado Benefits Management System, after its initial startup in 2004, had a one-time backlog of 30,000 applicants for food stamps, pension benefits and Medicaid.
At the time, Reinertson likened Colorado’s $3 billion Medicaid budget, which her office oversaw, to a gigantic, jelly-filled ball.
“You squeeze it at one end, and it pooches out on the other,” she was quoted in a 2004 Denver Post Perspective column.
Part of the system crossover was an attempt to root out abuse or corruption — free-ride benefits. Reinertson, however, didn’t lose sight of how crucial benefits are to those who honestly rely on them.
“Medicaid pays for people no one else will pay for,” she said. “We are the insurer of last resort. We are the safety net.”
Maria Garcia Berry met Reinertson in 1975, and they became fast friends, leading to a business partnership.
“Karen is one of the smartest people I’ve ever met in my life,” said Garcia Berry, head of CRL Associates, a lobbying and political consulting firm. “She could analyze something faster than anyone and figure out a solution.”
Sam Mamet, executive director of the Colorado Municipal League, knew and worked with Reinertson since the late 1970s. “She was tough; she was fair. But above all she was fun,” Mamet said.
He recalls Reinertson at work with a cigarette in one hand and a milk carton in the other. “The milk was for ulcers,” Mamet said.
Reinertson left the HCPF in 2005 and was named president of Front Range Community College. She moved to Texas in 2007 to be closer to her two sons and grandchildren.
A memorial service in Denver is being planned for spring.
