With budget woes, health care goes
Health care funding stalled while state lawmakers battle over the budget
By Shane Cohn 09/09/2010
California is quickly approaching three months into the current fiscal year without having a budget passed. With Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger embarking on a six-day trade mission in Asia, there still exists a $19 billion budget deficit. The Republicans and Democrats in the state Legislature remain entrenched in the fight over a feasible budget plan.
The battle is largely about how to handle $4 billion to $5 billion of the $19 billion deficit. To bridge the remainder of the deficit, the Republicans’ plan calls for eliminating the state’s welfare-to-work program and state subsidized post-preschool child-care programs, plus heavier cuts into low-income elderly care facilities and services.
The Democrats’ plan includes a $2.1 billion delay of corporate tax benefits; a $1.8 billion tax swap that reduces the sales tax and increases the income tax and a tax on oil production that would raise $600 million. Additionally, the plan would spare the slashing of the welfare-to-work program and child care services, and also avoid tighter Medi-Cal restrictions.
In regard to Medi-Cal, the Legislature’s inaction has produced a devastating impact on vital adult health services in Ventura County. The Ventura County Adult Day Health Care Center is facing financial ruin if state lawmakers cannot quickly agree on a budget plan.
The center receives 99 percent of its funding from Medi-Cal, but because of the budget crisis, Medi-Cal has suspended funding until the budget is passed. For more than two weeks, the center has been without funding. Now, the center’s participants and staff are at risk of being displaced, said Genny Da Roza, the center’s program director. Furthermore, the center faces the threat of temporarily having to close its doors.
“People here that live alone and are sick will end up in emergency rooms and nursing facilities,” said Da Roza about facing the possibility of closure. “We’re providing care for people who are sick. This is a much-needed program.”
But the program would be eliminated in Schwarzenegger’s proposed budget, which would leave the center’s 200-plus participants without care. With more than 300 Adult Day Heath Care centers in California, many of them relying heavily on Medi-Cal for funding, it is likely most centers would shut down resulting in the loss of 16,000-20,000 jobs, according to center operators.
“I know how important the day center is,” said state Sen. Fran Pavley (D-Agoura Hills). “We can minimize cuts to these programs, to K-12 education, to support services for elderly and disabled.”
Pavley added, “There is a cut for over 60 percent of all mental health programs in the governor’s proposed budget.
We’re cutting, to that extent, mental health services, and the challenges they’re facing everyday do not go away.”
Pavely said that society will feel the repercussion if patients in adult health centers throughout California are displaced. She suggested it would increase homelessness, the cost of law enforcement, and the possibility of the displaced ending up in the criminal justice system, which would ultimately be more expensive.
State Sen. Tony Strickland (R-Thousand Oaks) was not available for comment.
Ventura County Adult Day Health Care is not the only center feeling the pinch. Among Friends, the first licensed Adult Day Health Care center (2001) in Ventura County, has obtained a $250,000 line of credit from Bank of America to keep its doors open while Medi-Cal withholds funding during the budget crisis. Mark Kovalik, administrator and owner of Among Friends, said this is the third year his center has had to obtain a line of credit due to the state’s budget woes.
“It’s costly to renew every year because of the fixed fee and interest associated with it,” said Kovalik, “but to provide services we have to keep employees and make payroll.”
Kovalik estimated that the approved credit line is only enough to keep the doors open for another month.
“Who knows when this budget will be done? If we run out of money, we will have to shut down,” Kovalik said.
Though the timing of Schwarzenegger’s trip to Asia has received a barrage of criticism from state lawmakers, the governor insists the trip could lead to billions of dollars of business for companies in the state. Budget talks will resume in the state’s Capitol but it is unlikely that the governor’s absence will do anything to hasten a budget resolution.
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