New York State Builds Coalition

From New York State: BROAD AD HOC COALITION URGES REJECTION OF 12-HOUR CAP ON PERSONAL CARE

The 2010-11 Executive Budget would require seniors and people with disabilities who need more than 12 hours of Medicaid personal care services per day to switch to other programs that are not designed to meet round-the-clock needs caused by quadriplegia, Parkinson’s, stroke, Multiple Sclerosis, Alzheimer’s disease, etc. By limiting access to services for the most disabled – 4,268 of the 67,937 people receiving personal care services - the cap will cause unnecessary nursing home placement of people who can and do live in the community, violating the 1999 Supreme Court Olmstead decision and the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Activists in New York State are seeking your help! You can send a quick online letter to help stop the caps at http://capwiz.com/rochestercdr/issues/alert/?alertid=14698626. Click today!

The New York State Coalition includes the following groups:

ADAPT – NYS; Alzheimer's Association, New York City Chapter; Alzheimer's and Aging Resource Center of Brooklyn; Bronx Independent Living Services; Brooklyn Center for Independence of the Disabled; Catskill Center for Independence serving Delaware, Otsego, Schoharie, and Chenango Counties; Center for Disability Rights, Rochester; Center for Independence of the Disabled in New York (CIDNY); Cerebral Palsy Associations of NYS; Cerebral Palsy of the North Country - St. Lawrence, Franklin, & Jefferson Counties; The Children's Aid Society; CLC Foundation, Inc., Trustee For The CLC Pooled Trusts Iⅈ Consumer Directed Choices, Inc.; Consumer Directed Personal Assistance Association of New York State, Incl Disability Advocates, Inc. (serving Albany, Clinton, Columbia, Dutchess, Essex, Franklin, Fulton, Greene, Hamilton, Montgomery, Rensselaer, Saratoga, Schenectady, Schoharie, St. Lawrence, Ulster, Warren and Washington counties); Disabled in Action of Greater Syracuse Inc.; DOROT, Inc.; Empire Justice Center (all NYS outside of NYC); Enable, Syracuse; F.E.G.S Health and Human Services System; Options/CDPAS, Newburgh -- Dutchess, Orange, Sullivan & Ulster Counties; JASA/Queens Legal Services for the Elderly; The Legal Aid Society, New York City; Legal Services for the Elderly and Disabled, Buffalo; Lenox Hill Neighborhood House; Main Street Legal Services, Inc., CUNY School of Law; Medicaid Matters NY (140-member statewide coalition); Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty
MFY Legal Services, Inc.; Morningside Retirement and Health Services (MRHS); National Center for Law and Economic Justice; New Yorkers for Accessible Health Coverage; New York Lawyers for the Public Interest; New York Legal Assistance Group, New York City; PHI (Paraprofessional Healthcare Institute); Regional Center for Independent Living, Rochester; Resource Center for Independent Living, Utica; Self-Advocacy Association of New York State, Inc.; Selfhelp Community Services, Inc.; United Jewish Organization of Williamsburg; United Spinal Association; UJA-Federation New York; Westchester Disabled on the Move, Inc.; Westchester Jewish Community Services.

Contact:
Valerie Bogart, Selfhelp Community Services, Inc , vbogart@selfhelp.net 212.971.7693
Chris Hilderbrant, Center for Disability Rights, childerbrant@cdrnys.org 585.546.7510

Home Care Protests in Missouri

From our friend Bob Williams:

Disabled protest state’s proposed cuts in home care
By Virginia Young
Post-Dispatch Jefferson City Bureau

JEFFERSON CITY — People with disabilities and their caregivers came to the Capitol today to protest a budget cut that could make it harder for the disabled to remain in their homes.

On the chopping block: personal care services, which include assistance with meals, dressing and bathing.

Gov. Jay Nixon’s proposed budget would limit personal assistance services that a person can receive under the Medicaid program to 3.5 hours a day, or 60 hours a month. Those with greater needs could appeal for an additional 20 hours a month.

Nixon’s budget counts on $8.6 million in savings — $3.1 million in state funds and $5.5 million in federal funds — from the cutback.

Many people on Medicaid receive more than 60 hours of personal care a month. They say that without the attendant services, they could be forced to move to nursing homes, which are more expensive and would cost the state more than home care.

At a Capitol press conference today, Bob Pund of Columbia, who was paralyzed in an auto accident 20 years ago, said he needs help “in nearly every aspect of my life. Attendants are like oxygen to me.”

Not only is it a safety net, it helps people maintain their dignity and quality of life, others said.



For more, see http://interact.stltoday.com/blogzone/political-fix/political-fix/2010/02/disabled-protest-states-proposed-cuts-in-home-care/

New York State Deals With Governor Paterson

Check out this video on the state budget fight in New York: http://www.cdrnys.org/video/proposedbudgetYNN.html. The video is captioned.

On Monday, February 1st, a group of New York disability rights advocates met with the Governor Paterson and key staff regarding his budget proposal to cap personal care at 12 hours per day.

After delays with security, we started the meeting with quick introductions and a brief context for the meeting. At about that point, the Governor walked in; we did a quick round of re-introductions and got back to business.

Throughout the meeting, the Governor played a calming role as his staff and the advocates argued. He expressed a willingness to admit that their proposal might have negative consequences that they had not intended. The advocates poked holes in the administration's proposal, but the Governor would intervene and say that they had already admitted that the proposal might not be perfect, suggesting the group "move forward"... then his staff would start defending the proposal again.

Michelle, who is directly affected by the cut, explained the effect that this proposal would have on her. She explained that just days before giving birth to her daughter, she got her spinal cord injury and became a quad. She left the hospital to live with her mother who was now taking care of both her and her newborn daughter. She wasn't ever able to get the personal care she needed in Seneca County so she moved into a less accessible apartment in Ontario County where she could finally get services. She pointed out that she now must take a 45-minute drive to take a shower, but that's how important her independence was to her. She emphasized that people who get this level of service really need it, and it clearly wasn't that easy to get. She spoke about how she was finally able to raise her own daughter and be a mom. And she spoke about how she feared that losing the services would mean she would lose her freedom... and her family.

So we asked the administration why they hadn't used the cost-savings proposals that we had developed in November, long before any of these cuts were proposed. Our proposals didn't eliminate community-based services. Instead, they actually promoted the independence of people with disabilities by maximizing community-based approaches and cost-effective consumer-directed services. We acknowledged that our original proposals may have been aggressive, so we had ratcheted them down. Even so, we still projected $30 million to $90 million in savings for the first year, easily covering the saving the administration expected from capping personal care.

In a nutshell, our proposals said that the state could save money by moving people from nursing facilities to the Nursing Facility Transition and Diversion Waiver. The staffers felt that our target of 1,300 people statewide was unrealistically aggressive, but never explained how they felt nearly 5,000 people could be enrolled in NYC alone under their proposal. They also argued that daily savings rate we used was too high, even though our revised version was taken straight from the DOH's TBI Waiver report to CMS.

The staff also complained that our proposal assumed that we would close nursing facility beds, but there isn't the political will to make that happen. We argued that the state, particularly in such difficult fiscal times, shouldn't prioritize the institutions over people. At this point the Governor stepped in and said that they wanted some time to review our proposals. We urged them to eliminate the 12-hour cap in their 21 day amendments.

The pessimistic side is that the staff seemed committed to the cap.

The optimistic side is that they agreed to look more closely at our revised proposal. The Governor has clearly made this something they have to address. They know that they are going to be flambéed every step of the way with the 12-hour cap.

We don't know what will happen, but whatever happens, this is only the start of the process!

To learn more about CDR, see http://www.cdrnys.org/.