Budget Conference Committees Begin, E-Prescribing Update, Minimum Wage Battle Continues, and Time to Re-engage with Lawmakers
Budget Conference Committees Begin
As we reported on Monday, the Assembly and Senate majority conferences advanced their one-house budget priorities over the weekend. Both houses passed their versions of the budget on Monday and convened the Joint Budget Conference Committee on Tuesday. The Joint Budget Subcommittees began meetings on Wed.
The General Budget Conference Committee (“The Mothership”) met for the first time Tues. afternoon to summarize each Conference’s top priorities. Senate Majority Leader Flanagan listed his Conference’s top priorities as an on-time budget, a property tax cap, holding the state to a 2% spending cap and transportation, higher education and education spending. Assembly Speaker Heastie listed his Conference’s top priorities as affordable housing, an increased minimum wage, paid family leave, childcare and education. Independent Conference Leader Senator Klein highlighted the proposals from his conference, including paid family leave, college affordability, afterschool programs and housing assistance. He also spoke on senior citizens, housing, and Senior Citizen Rent Increase Exemption (SCRIE).
Health Budget Subcommittee: The Joint Legislative Subcommittee on Health, co-chaired by Assemblyman Richard Gottfried and Senator Kemp Hannon, laid out their priorities going into budget negotiations.
Assemblyman Gottfried highlighted the Assembly majority’s priorities, which include funding the raise in minimum wage and ensuring that Managed Long-Term Care (MLTC) plans receive sufficient reimbursement to pass along to providers and workers, and ensuring a smooth transition of the NHTD/TBI waivers into MLTC. Assemblyman Cymbrowitz emphasized that the senior population is increasing exponentially and that the state needs to be prepared to support older adults, and he encouraged program changes and increased funding for NORC/NNORCs. Assemblyman Raia expressed grave concern over the impact of an increased minimum wage on providers, saying any increase must be fully funded and calling the Assembly’s $200 million allocation “a drop in bucket” of what is actually needed.
Senator Hannon indicated that he is very fearful about the viability of the long term care sector, citing concerns around insufficient funding for nursing home and home care providers, the timeliness of payments and the fact that the MLTC plans are not doing well. He went on to say that with the growing population of seniors, things need to get better. Hannon also mentioned modernizing the NORC/NNORC program and an SSI increase. Senator Serino expressed support for a $3M increase for the Community Services for the Elderly program in an effort to reduce waiting.
Gottfried and Hannon concluded the meeting agreeing, “we have our work cut out for us.”
Housing (Environment and Agriculture) Budget Subcommittee: The Joint Budget Subcommittee on Environment, Agriculture, and Housing is co-chaired by Assemblyman Englebright and Senator Little, and covers wide and divergent areas of the budget – so only a portion of the discussion was related to housing.
Senator Little thanked Senate staff for helping to develop a housing proposal "that includes a clear commitment to affordable housing." She mentioned that funding for capital and community development programs will help "create and preserve affordable housing." Little also praised the Senate for fully funding the network of rural and neighborhood preservation companies.
Assemblyman Wright, Assembly Housing Chair, took the opportunity to stress the importance of affordable housing, saying: "One of the most critical issues facing people, not just in NYC, but all over the state is that of truly affordable housing.” He stated that the Assembly proposal fully restores the Tenant Protection Unit at $5.8 million and provides $100 million annually for NYC Public Housing Authority tenants. He also mentioned the Assembly supports Mitchell-Lama and Senior housing.
Next Steps: The next significant step necessary for the Subcommittees to move forward is the establishment of “table targets” by “The Mothership.” This is the process in which they divide the available funds available to each Subcommittee that can be used to restore cuts, modify proposals or fund new initiatives. We expect to see the table targets announced in the next few days.
E-Prescribing Update
We are very pleased to announce that the Commissioner of Health, Howard A. Zucker, M.D., J.D., has issued a waiver for nursing homes from the e-prescribing mandate through at least March 27, 2017. This important pronouncement comes after several weeks of focused advocacy by LeadingAge NY and its members, amid concerns that nursing homes, practitioners, pharmacies and software vendors were not prepared to comply with the e-prescribing requirements slated to go into effect on March 27, 2016. Find the commissioner’s letter here.
In the letter, the Department of Health (DOH) acknowledges that “…in a nursing home/residential health care facility setting, electronic prescribing may not be available due to technological or economic issues or other exceptional circumstances, including a heavy reliance upon oral communications with the prescriber and pharmacy.” This important acknowledgment came as the result of advocacy by LeadingAge NY and other groups we worked with to convince DOH and the Administration that several unresolved e-prescribing technological and process issues remained that could have adversely affected timely and correct administration of medications to nursing home residents.
More recently, our advocacy focused on the Legislature and resulted in bills in both houses aimed at addressing these issues. The bill has now passed both houses of the Legislature.
Thank you to all of our members who took the time to advocate with the governor and their legislators on this issue. Your advocacy was an important part of our success.
Minimum Wage Battle Continues
Cuomo joined a large union rally at the Capital on Tuesday, in support of his minimum wage increase. As reported by the Times Union, Cuomo balked at the idea of increasing money for state contracts with non-profits to help ease the pains of an increase. “We raise the minimum wage all the time; we’ve raised it about eight times over the past couple of decades,” he said. “We have never adjusted the contracts to reflect the minimum wage increase. Never….. I went through a war with a lot of these not-for-profits where I wanted a $200,000 income cap….. If they have employees making $200,000 in income, they’re going to have a tough case coming to me and arguing that they need money to now pay their employees a $15 minimum wage.”
Assemblyman Minority Leader Brian Kolb stood with his colleagues in the Assembly Minority Conference to speak out on the devastating impact that raising the minimum wage will have on the small business community, farming industry, health care and non-profit organizations. The Assembly Republicans are calling instead for expanding the state's earned income tax credit, which provides tax relief to low-income, working families but whose benefit threshold has remained flat.
Time to Re-engage with Lawmakers
With the passage of the one-house budget bills and the commencing of the Budget Conference Committee process, it is important for members to reach out to their legislators again to reiterate their priorities and concerns in the budget negotiations. Below is the latest information on the key issues we have been working on and links to updated messages for you to send to your legislators. Emails are great – but remember that taking the time to post on Facebook or to tweet means your message will get spread wider and may pick up additional advocates.
Invest in Health Care Infrastructure Program: Only token amounts of recent multi-billion dollar investments in the State’s health care delivery system have been allocated to long-term care services. Remarkably, only 1 percent of the $1.5 billion in recent awards under the State’s CRFP and EHCP initiatives was allocated to long-term care services. Only about 5 percent of the DSRIP Performing Provider System waiver revenue has been allocated to long-term care services. This is why LeadingAge New York is urging lawmakers to specifically dedicate $100 million in capital funding and $10 million in additional operating funding in the 2016-17 State Budget to support the essential infrastructure needs for long-term care services. Make sure your legislators know New York needs critical investments in long-term care infrastructure – health information technology (HIT), telehealth, and facility upgrades – if we are to optimize the quality of services for seniors and enable providers to function efficiently and effectively in today’s rapidly changing health care environment. Share our Infrastructure Flyer with your lawmakers today!
Fully Fund Minimum Wage Increase: The Assembly and Senate majority conferences have staked out their positions on the minimum wage. The Senate rejects the wage increase while the Assembly supports it but substantially underfunds it, with only $200 million allocated across the health and human services spectrum of services. Tell your lawmakers that the final budget must reconcile these positions so that if an increase in the minimum wage is included, its cost to affected providers must be fully funded. Find our campaign here and Tweet, Facebook and email your lawmakers by texting MINIMUM WAGE to 52886.
Invest in Senior Housing and Support Services: The Assembly proposes $150 million over five years, $30 million per year, for a senior affordable housing program, modeled after the NYS Housing Trust Fund. In addition, they have included a new program for rental assistance for low income residents. LeadingAge NY had advocated for a portion of housing funds to be specifically dedicated to seniors. Help us ensure this important funding is included in the final budget. Use this link to send a letter directly to your elected representatives or Tweet, Facebook and email your lawmakers by texting HOUSING to 52886.
Invest in Adult Care & Assisted Living Services: The Senate proposal includes an increase in SSI Congregate Care Level 3 for adult care facility (ACF) residents of the state portion of the SSI benefit, which amounts to approximately $7.50 per day. The Assembly proposal does not include any increase. It is crucial to let lawmakers know how important it is to increase the state’s SSI rate for low-income seniors living in adult care facilities and assisted living settings and that $15 per day is needed to bring the rate up to an adequate level. You can advocate on this issue by visiting our SSI Increase Advocacy page to send an email, Tweet or Facebook your lawmakers.
Transportation Carve-Out: Both houses rejected the Governor’s proposal to carve transportation out of the managed long term care (MLTC) benefit package as well as the adult day health care (ADHC) and nursing home rates. The Senate further requires the DOH to perform an annual review and report to legislature of state contracted transportation managers’ activities. LeadingAge NY is very pleased that the Legislature has rejected the governor’s proposal, but we will need to keep up the pressure to ensure the final enacted budget includes these changes. Click here to support our efforts by sending a letter to your elected officials, tweeting them or posting a message on their Facebook page.