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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Huckleberries Online

Idaho auditors: Pharmacist’s deal excessive

BOISE — Every time the pharmacist at the Idaho State Veterans Home in Boise hands out aspirin to a resident, he’s due $11.

He gets the same fee for dispensing other over-the-counter and prescription medications, too.

Jan Poreba, the pharmacist, used this lucrative arrangement to take in an average $14,884 every month — on top of a separate $15,000 monthly fee that pushed Idaho’s payments to him to $358,619 in the 2010 fiscal year.

If Poreba’s compensation package sounds excessive, the state’s Legislative Services auditors say that’s because it is.

They’ve concluded Poreba’s deal with the Boise veterans home is unreasonably generous, especially when compared to less-costly agreements that administrators at Idaho’s other two homes for aging veterans in Pocatello and Lewiston have struck with their own contract pharmacy providers.



Huckleberries Online

D.F. Oliveria started Huckleberries Online on Feb. 16, 2004. Oliveria's Sunday print Huckleberries is a past winner of the national Herb Caen Memorial Column contest.