Human Services Chief: Cuts Hurt Elder Care

News-Telegram

Fitchburg, MA -- People receiving services and others who provide them testified at a forum at Fitchburg State College last night on how cuts to state aid have affected programs.

The forum, moderated by Secretary of Health and Human Services Dr. JudyAnn Bigby, was one of 19 planned across the state seeking input on the upcoming state budget and how to fill a projected $3 billion deficit in fiscal 2011. A panel comprised of Health and Human Services officials also attended.

In a pre-recorded address played at the start of the forum, Gov. Deval Patrick said his administration was going through the budget line by line to find savings while still providing services to the most vulnerable populations in the state. He said his administration was building a budget around community values.

Greg A. Giuliano, incoming executive director of Montachusett Home Care — an agency that provides in-home and community-based services to the elderly — said cuts in state funding have diminished the agency’s ability to provide services.

“It’s important to back up the rhetoric about building a budget around community values,” he said.

He said the agency’s parent organization, Mass. Home Care, which works to keep elders from having to enter nursing homes, has more than 2,000 elderly on a waiting list for services.

The state, he said, impounded $2.5 million that was targeted for staff who go into hospitals and educate people on their rights to community care that can divert them from nursing homes. Additionally, he said, the group-home model that places four elderly people in a ranch house instead of a nursing home has been derailed by the state for two years; and the elder abuse program was cut by $1 million.

He urged the state to restore funding to those areas and not make further cuts.

Suggestions from the audience to fill the state’s deficit to avoid further cuts to services included legalizing marijuana and taxing it to increase revenues, increasing taxes on tobacco products and just generally increasing taxes.

Linda C. Lolly, a personal care assistant for people with mental illnesses, was a proponent of legalizing and taxing marijuana to save in-home services to those she supports.

“I have seen it over and over again that an elderly person can stay in their home when someone comes in and gives them a bath and gets them dressed for the day,” Ms. Lolly, who works for Arcadia Health Care in Worcester, said. “That’s just a few hours instead of having them go into nursing homes that cost thousands of dollars because there is no one else to do it for them.”

Dr. Bigby said the upcoming budget cycle is going to be even more difficult than last year because fiscal 2010 was balanced on $2.1 billion from one-time revenues. Moreover, there is only $561 million left in the state’s stabilization fund, she said, that may be needed in this budget cycle.

The Health and Human Services budget totals $13.7 billion — 51 percent of the state’s overall budget of $27 billion.

Elder Care Survival Key Concern At County Forum

Courier News

Kane County, Il -- Nearly 100 Kane County elder care providers, senior citizens and their advocates discussed federal and state issues relating to elder care during a legislative forum Monday in St. Charles.

The event was sponsored by Kane County Senior Resources, Asbury Gardens, Countryside Care Center, Heritage Woods of Yorkville, and the Northeastern Illinois Area Agency on Aging.

Among challenges discussed were the state of Illinois' lagging Medicare payments to small businesses that provide elder care and services.

Betty Schoenholtz, executive director of Senior Services Associates, said state payments to elder care providers -- many of whom are small-business owners -- have lagged for months because of the state's budget shortages.

"It is of great concern to me what is happening to our (provider) agencies," Schoenholtz said, adding that those funds would help stimulate the economy through purchases made by small businesses. "When the state of Illinois doesn't pay its bills, we can't buy things from small business ... We hope (state legislators) can step up to the plate and resolve these issues."

She also recommended that legislators change state law to require the Illinois Department of Public Health to allocate at least $750,000 into the ombudsman program, or to implement a "bed fee" similar to Ohio's, which requires a $6-per-bed fee to help offset costs to agencies. Schoenholtz also said the elder abuse program is owed $134,000 from the state and that the figure represents one-third the budget for elder abuse cases.

Lucia Jones, executive director of the Northeastern Illinois Area Agency on Aging, also said she is concerned about how the state's budget issues are impacting service providers.

"The providers are all small-business owners," Jones said. "The numbers they serve are going up tremendously, because of the economy ... . There are hundreds and thousands of families in the state of Illinois in need of elder care; and if the ombudsman program is cut, those people will have to go into long-term care."

AARP spokesperson Heather Heppner also provided an update. "We have spent a very long time advocating to prevent cuts to community-based services. We know it is more fiscally responsible to care for individuals in their homes than in institutions," she said. "We have providers who have not been paid this entire fiscal year ... . Senior services need to have a heightened level of priority."

She also noted that AARP endorsed the Affordable Healthcare for America Act.

"On the House bill side, it was not perfect ... but the bottom line is that our health care system in this country is broken, and the things our AARP members have told us are important issues are addressed in that bill," Heppner said. Older adults were at times paying up to seven times more in insurance rates than younger adults, she said, and the health care act would cap age rating at two to one.