Changes Coming to Health Department

Maryland Health Secretary Laura Herrera Scott will leave the position she has held since the start of the Moore administration to make room for Meena Seshamani, who until recently was deputy administrator at the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

The governor’s office said Thursday that Herrera Scott, who has been secretary since January 2023, will stay until the end of this month, when she will be temporarily succeeded by Deputy Secretary for Health Care Financing Ryan Moran. Seshamani will take over on April 8, pending Senate approval of her appointment.

Herrera Scott’s departure comes as her agency is at the center of a budget storm, with a $200 million cut to the Developmental Disabilities Administration among the biggest single cuts as the state struggles to close a $3 billion gap in the fiscal 2026 budget. That proposal has sparked emotional rallies by members of the disabilities community as well as pushback from lawmakers.

The department last spring also announced that it had underestimated Medicaid expenses by $236 million, sending lawmakers scrambling to find funds in the final month of the legislative session. And Herrera Scott came under fire in December for her handling of complaints at the Clifton T. Perkins Hospital Center, a high-security hospital that has been riddled with complaints of patient abuse and violence.

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