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The state’s Medicaid Director Nicole Comeaux is leaving her position, the New Mexico Human Services Department announced Tuesday.
Comeaux served as director of the Medical Assistance Division, which oversees the state’s Medicaid program, since 2019, HSD said. The department did not immediately have information on a replacement for Comeaux.
In a statement, Dr. David Scrase, the state’s HSD secretary, said Comeaux had provided “outstanding leadership for our state’s Medicaid program over the past four years.”
“I will miss Nicole (Comeaux) greatly,” he said. “… While we all completely support her taking more time with her family, we also look forward to the work that we are sure she will perform nationally to continue to improve Medicaid programs.”
Under Comeaux’s leadership, the state’s Medicaid program saw a more than $2 billion annual increase in federal health care revenue, including the expansion of benefits for new mothers and children “that have measurably improved health,” Scrase said.
She led the division during the COVID-19 pandemic when Medicaid saw a large increase in enrollment and as the state began prepping for some of those enrollees – up to 100,000 – to be dropped from the program.
Comeaux also helped lead the charge in the state’s recent shift to a newly revamped Medicaid program called “Turquoise Care,” which is set to begin in January 2024.
“It has been my honor to serve alongside the smart, compassionate, dedicated leadership team at the Human Services Department, and it has been my privilege to do so with committed partners across the state, on behalf of so many New Mexicans,” Comeaux said.
