Highmark wants to shrink its 36-member board of directors down to size.(Highmark Blue Cross Blue Shield)

Insurer says current number causes logistics woes

DOWNTOWN - Highmark Blue Cross Blue Shield wants to reduce the size of its board of directors. The nonprofit insurer's board has 36 members and it would like to whittle that down to somewhere in the low 20s, said Highmark spokesman Doug Smith.

The disclosure is interesting for several reasons. For starters, Highmark is under even more intense scrutiny than usual since it revealed that it is considering converting to for-profit status (Business Times, May 14).

In addition, the development will likely revive a controversy over the makeup of the Highmark board that surfaced prior to Highmark's creation with the 1996 merger of Blue Cross of Western Pennsylvania and Pennsylvania Blue Shield.

In particular, some physicians and health care professionals opposed the merger then because it diluted their board representation. …