PORT ANGELES — Significant budget cuts Gov. Chris Gregoire has handed down to state long-term care services could affect about half of home-care clients and caregivers supported through Olympic Community Action Programs in Clallam and Jefferson counties, an OlyCAP executive warned.
Robin Gibson, OlyCAP’s director of adult care and nutrition services, said about 50 percent of 115 clients across the North Olympic Peninsula could be affected.
“Over 20 percent of our population in this area are 65 or older, and many of these folks depend on home-care services to remain independent,” Gibson said.
The changes will have the greatest impact on the people around the state who receive support through the Aging and Disability Services Administration, but everyone who uses home-care services will likely be affected, she said.
OlyCAP is not the only agency affected.
The Korean Women’s Association, which employs 160 in Clallam County, has sent out notices of the possibility of layoffs to workers, according to a prepared statement.
No more details were available Tuesday.
Budget halved
The trickle-down effects of the governor’s cut would halve OlyCAP’s annual $1.8 million home-care budget, Gibson said.
Home-care services allow aging individuals to live at home under supervised care without having to be placed in an assisted living center.
Responding to declining state revenues, Gregoire in September ordered a 6.3 percent across-the-board cut in state departmental budgets and made each agency responsible for how those cuts would be accomplished.
$4.3 billion in cuts
Those cuts, totaling $4.3 billion, would close in on balancing a $28 billion biennial budget for 2011-12.
The Aging and Disability Services Administration, part of the Department of Social and Health Services, has developed a plan that includes significant cuts for support of long-term care services that will have a significant impact on virtually all Clallam and Jefferson counties’ seniors who depend on home-care services, Gibson said.
“They’ll receive some form of care, but it won’t be at same level that they are receiving now,” she said.
Independent providers
The administration plans to move half of the 12,000 clients now served through licensed home-care agencies to independent providers beginning Monday.
Currently, home-care agencies employ aides, screen them for criminal records and provide management and supervisory services to ensure quality services, prevent abuse and track actual hours used.
They also perform functions such as finding substitute caregivers and replacing caregivers when there is not a satisfactory match.
Cognitive tests
“The state will use a cognitive test to screen clients and determine who will be moved to independent providers,” Gibson said.
“And once the decision is made, the client will not have a choice.”
Clients will no longer have the support of a state agency.
Each client moved will become responsible for selecting, hiring, supervising and training providers in the things that need to be done in the home and to meet care plans.
The state supports access to independent providers through referral registries operating on a local or regional basis.
Independent providers
Independent providers who enter the registry are screened for criminal records and official findings of abuse or neglect.
They are not screened for training because they can obtain their required training within 120 days of hire, Gibson said.
Beginning Jan. 1, there will be a 10 percent reduction in support for home-care service hours.
The state will consider individual needs in assessing how any individual’s hours are cut, but individual clients can expect reductions between 6 percent and 18 percent.
The changes, Gibson said, will affect all the home-care agencies in the area by reducing the staffing hours that support agency activities.
Out of business
“We can expect to see some agencies go out of business,” Gibson said.
The Washington State Homecare Coalition is working on presenting some alternative proposals to the Aging and Disability Services Administration, and OlyCAP is contacting representatives of that agency and the Governor’s Office.
“We’re working on it,” Gibson said. “It’s scaring a lot of people.”
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Sequim-Dungeness Valley Editor Jeff Chew can be reached at 360-681-2391 or at jeff.chew@peninsuladailynews.com.
