May 10, 2005

Seniors and people with disabilities protest proposed cuts to home aid program

By Sheila Sanchez
Staff Writer

Society’s most frail—seniors and people with disabilities—came in throngs last week to a town hall meeting in Campbell to blast Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s proposed cuts to a critical program that allows them to remain at home instead of at expensive care institutions.

Assemblywoman Rebecca Cohn, D-Campbell thanks Terri Carter, 40, a spinal-cord injury victim, who participated in a town hall meeting April 22 to bring attention to the importance of the In-Home Supportive Services program. The program’s funding could be cut as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger tries to balance the state budget. Photo by Sheila Sanchez

Testifying before a panel of Democratic state legislative leaders, In-Home Supportive Services program clients did their best to educate the public about their plight. The program is funded with state and county dollars.

Cohn, a Democrat who represents Campbell, organized the event with the help of Santa Clara County Supervisor Jim Beall. Also attending the rally were Democratic Assembly members Sally Lieber, Joe Coto and Ira Ruskin.

None offered any explanations as to why the governor is proposing the cuts and none sounded impartial. Instead they laughed and applauded as the audience called the governor “the terminator.”

“We urge you not to let the terminator terminate our lives,” said Lynne Carlton, the manager of the Le Beaulie Apartment Complex for people with disabilities.

H.D. Palmer, deputy director for the California Department of Finance, said the state is facing a $9 billion budget deficit for the 2005-06 fiscal year.

Since 1998, the caseload of people being served by the program has grown by 65 percent, Palmer said. Over that same period, however, the costs to the state’s general fund have grown almost twice as fast, by 120 percent.

Palmer explained the primary reason for the growth has been increases in wages negotiated by local governments through collective bargaining agreements with unions and county governments. “The state pays a state share of the cost of this program, but we don’t have a seat at the bargaining table. Whatever rate is negotiated, the state is on the hook for an increased share of costs,” Palmer said.

Schwarzenegger’s budget proposes to cap the state’s share to fund the program, which will equal wages for program workers of $6.75 an hour. “If local governments want to negotiate a higher wage level, they’re certainly free to do so, it’s just they’ll be responsible for a greater share of the cost,” Palmer said.

Last year, Schwarzenegger negotiated with federal officials a change in policy for California with the Department of Health and Human Services that allowed federal dollars to be drawn down and used for the program. The move benefited the state and county budgets, he explained. In a two-year period, the savings Schwarzenegger achieved through the federal negotiations is roughly $200 million, Palmer said. “The governor freed up $200 million in costs for counties that are specifically tied to this program. That’s fiscal relief they didn’t have until this governor went back to Washington and secured this agreement with the feds.”

However, Beall, who co-sponsored the April 22 afternoon event with Cohn at the Campbell Community Center, declared, “The governor is out to get us.”

The In-Home Supportive Services program serves more than 10,200 people in the county and more than 348,000 people in the state.

The wage reductions would affect the more than 7,000 caregivers who help program clients who will make $6.75 an hour instead of the present $9.50 an hour, plus .60 cents per hour for health benefits that they receive.

An estimated 2,280 program participants would be institutionalized if caregivers’ wages were lowered, they said.

Wearing yellow buttons emblazoned with the words “there’s no place like home,” the protesters spoke in favor of the program despite their limitations. Many were low-income people who suffer from severe disabilities like cerebral palsy who receive personal care services such as feeding, bathing, dressing, house cleaning, laundry and grocery shopping.

“People who provide these services are some of the most hardworking caring dedicated people that I’ve come to know,” said Ann Browman, protesting the proposed wage reductions for caregivers. “I wouldn’t be able to do what I do on a daily basis if I didn’t have their help… It’s time to stand up and be counted.”

A wheelchair-bound Sandy Perry, who became paralyzed after being hit by a car in 1997, cried asking the governor to preserve the program. “Please don’t cut these services. It will affect me because I can’t do certain things for myself. I really need a worker there to help me,” Perry said.

Dora Castro, a home-care worker and a Santa Clara County Public Authority advisor, said she cares for her 38-year-old wheel-chair bound daughter, Norma, who has cerebral palsy and is developmentally disabled. “I work extra hours to take care of my daughter. Every home care worker gets no sick leave, no vacation and no overtime and we’re still in for cuts?”

Barbara Stahl, a high school counselor, active senior and disabled rights advocate, also in a wheelchair, cried during her short testimony. “Just because my legs don’t work, doesn’t mean my brain doesn’t work… I would like to continue to be a productive member of society. If you cut the workers I won’t be able to get out of bed in the morning,” she said, the sound of her voice barely audible.

Myriam Escamilla, county director for the service workers affiliated with the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), Local 715, testified on behalf of the 7,000 home care workers in the county.

She said wages are so low for workers that laboring an average of 18 hours a week nets them only about $700 a month. “That amount is not enough to survive in this valley. This is not the county’s fault, it’s the governor’s fault who has no financial common sense,” Escamilla lamented.

Christine Walters, who cares for her 17-year-old developmentally delayed blind son, Derek, said if the proposed cuts go into effect she wouldn’t be able to keep him at home.

“Does our family matter so little to this governor? Someone needs to help this governor… My son is not a special interest. He’s a special-needs child. He (the governor) needs more than a lesson in English. He needs to learn a lesson in humanity,” Walters said to the cheers of the more than 300 people who gathered inside the community center.

Cohn said the Assembly budget sub-committee on health and human services rejected the governor’s IHSS budget proposal.

Heidi Cartan, of the California Association of Public Authority, the agency created by the state to manage the program, said the proposed cuts would also eliminate the state’s participation in the cost of benefits toward program participants, taking away their health, dental and vision insurance.

The state has participated in the cost of wages and benefits toward program caregivers since 1999. The state pays up to $10.10 an hour, or $9.50 an hour for wages and .60 cents for benefits.

Cartan encouraged meeting attendees to share and write down their stories and obtain more information about the issue by logging onto www.savehomecare.org.

Jim Ramoni, in-home support supportive services program manager for Santa Clara County, said program population has grown by more than 100 percent.

If the program is cut, Ramoni feared not many options would be available for its clients, noting nursing homes are few and their quality is questionable.

“This work is hard work and minimum wage would not be anything that anyone would be able to maintain,” Ramoni said. “Reducing program wages will degrade the quality by increasing worker turnover and leaving shortages in the supply of workers. We don’t want to take huge steps backwards.”

For more information on the state budget log onto www.dof.ca.gov.