CUOMO ADMINISTRATION ALLOCATES $5 MILLION TO FUND ATTENDANT OVERTIME

December 3, 2014 – Disability rights activists are praising Governor Cuomo for announcing yesterday that the state would allocate five million dollars to prevent service interruptions in consumer-directed attendant services. Advocates from the disability rights group ADAPT and from the Center for Disability Rights (CDR) met with the Cuomo Administration yesterday to find a solution to the impending crisis in attendant services caused by the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) rule changes. Fifty people from CDR and ADAPT came to Albany yesterday for this meeting, many of whom would be directly affected by the rule changes.

The regulation will require agencies to pay overtime and travel time to attendants who provide services to people with disabilities, starting January 1, 2015. Without funding, the regulation would have caused a crisis in care for people who use personal attendants because the federal rule changes did not provide for any additional funding to pay for overtime or travel time. Existing attendants would have their hours capped at 40, losing, in some cases, as much as 40% of their income. Consumers would have to hire new attendants – strangers – to come into their homes and assist them with eating, bathing, using the toilet, handling money, and a great many other truly intimate tasks. Given that there is an attendant shortage, many consumers might not be able to hire a new attendant: those consumers would be forced back into institutions, not only in violation of their civil rights but also at great additional cost to the State.

Faced with this problem, yesterday disability advocates welcomed the Administration’s commitment with open arms, as it is a necessary measure to avoid the impending crisis. At the same time, everyone in the room understood that the five million is a short-term solution and that more effort is needed to ensure that overtime is funded on an ongoing basis.

“This is a great first step,” said Bruce Darling of ADAPT. “We are truly grateful that the Cuomo Administration heard us on this issue, that they were willing to meet with us and listen to our concerns, and that they stepped in with this solution. We know that this represented a great deal of work on their part as well. This five million dollars buys us time to create a long-term fix in this budget session.”

There are some concerns that the five million dollars is not enough to cover the overtime obligation for the entire six-month period the Governor’s Administration has committed it. “This is a big victory,” said Bryan O’Malley of the Consumer-Directed Personal Assistance Association of New York State (CDPAANYS). O’Malley adds that he is “very concerned that it represents approximately half of the need for overtime alone.” O’Malley estimates the total annual cost for overtime at twenty million dollars.

“It’s a welcome solution,” says Adam Prizio of CDR, “but we need a permanent way to fund this obligation.” CDR and ADAPT have been advocating for the state to implement Community First Choice (CFC), a Medicaid funding mechanism which states can select. CDR estimates that CFC has the potential to draw between $300 million and $439 million in additional Federal funding to New York. ADAPT has worked hard to create CFC in the Affordable Care Act, and is advocating across the country for states to choose and implement CFC. “The state can fund the overtime through CFC, so that’s what we are going to fight for in this legislative session.”