Legislative Bulletin: Executive Budget Proposal Coming on Tuesday
Governor Cuomo to Present SFY 2018-19 Executive Budget Proposal on Tuesday
Mark your calendars! As reported earlier this week, Governor Cuomo is expected to unveil his SFY 2018-19 Executive Budget Proposal on Tues., Jan. 16th at 1 pm. The presentation will take place in the Clark Auditorium of the New York State Museum and be streamed live on the Governor’s website. LeadingAge NY expects the budget to provide more details on the proposals announced in last week’s State of the State address and will issue a detailed summary to members once it is released.
With Budget Season Coming, Start Scheduling Advocacy Day Meetings
Will you be joining us on Tues., Feb. 6th and Tues., March 6th for the LeadingAge NY/Adult Day Health Care Council/Hospice and Palliative Care Association of New York State Annual Advocacy Days? Now is the time to start thinking about scheduling meetings with your lawmakers! LeadingAge NY has found that constituents reaching out to legislators directly is often an effective way of getting substantive one-on-one meetings, whether in Albany or back in the district. If you do set up your own meetings, please share your schedule with Jeff Diamond at jdiamond@leadingageny.org so that we can coordinate with your colleagues. LeadingAge NY is also happy to assist with scheduling in any way we can.
Click here to register for our Feb. 6th Advocacy Day, which will focus on nursing home, home care, hospice, adult day health care (ADHC), and Managed Long Term Care (MLTC) issues. Registration for the March 6th Advocacy Day, focusing on housing, adult care facility (ACF)/assisted living (AL), aging services program, and Naturally Occurring Retirement Community (NORC) issues, is available here.
Register Now for Jan. 17th Webinar on Building, Engaging, and Empowering Social Media Followers
Thank you to all those who participated in the first session of LeadingAge NY and Corning Place Communications’ free webinar series on “Amplifying Your Voice and Building Your Business Through Social Media”! The webinar, “Adding New Tools to Your Advocacy and Marketing Toolbox: An Introduction to Twitter and Facebook,” was held on Wednesday and covered functionality, features, and standard practices for both platforms; what makes the platforms effective advocacy and marketing tools; and sample tweets and posts. A recording of the session is available here.
There is still time to register for our second session, “Putting Your New Tools to Work: Tips on Building, Engaging, and Empowering Your Community of Followers,” which will take place on Wed., Jan. 17th from 12 to 12:30 pm. Topics to be addressed include how to build a community of social media followers, the importance of establishing your “voice,” and how to engage with your followers through content and conversation. Please make sure that you have created Twitter and Facebook accounts for your organization prior to joining this session. LeadingAge NY can assist you in this process if necessary.
TBI-DD Integration Bill Advances in Senate
On Tuesday, S.517 (Young), legislation that would allow individuals with a traumatic brain injury (TBI) sustained after the age of 21 to access developmental disabilities services, advanced from the Senate Health to the Senate Finance Committee. Its Assembly companion, A.1425 (Jenne), has not yet moved out of the Health Committee.
LeadingAge NY continues to support this critical bill, which would ensure that those with a TBI living in urban, underserved, or rural areas, where caregiver shortages and a lack of TBI community resources often lead to placement into nursing homes, receive the support and services they need. To send your lawmakers a pre-written letter, tweet, or Facebook post urging their support, please click here.
Senate Majority Unveils “Affordability Agenda”
On Tuesday, the Senate Majority Conference formally unveiled the first piece of its “Blueprint for a Stronger New York”: an Affordability Agenda aimed at helping “more families and seniors afford to stay and thrive in their communities.” The agenda prioritizes lower income, property, energy, and pension income taxes as well as reforms to control spending and prevent tax increases. Specific proposals include helping New Yorkers negatively impacted by the new federal income tax changes; making the state’s 2 percent property tax cap permanent; freezing and ultimately eliminating school property taxes for seniors; and doubling the current exemption on pension income to make the state more affordable for retirees.
Senator Serrano Named Ranking Member of Senate Aging Committee
On Tuesday, Senate Democratic Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins issued her conference’s 2018 committee assignments. One of the most noteworthy changes is that Sen. Jose Serrano is now the Ranking Member of the Aging Committee, replacing Ruben Diaz, who was elected to the New York City Council in November. Sen. Serrano has served in the chamber since 2005.
With respect to Senate committee chairs, there are no significant differences from last session. Sen. Sue Serino will retain Aging, Sen. Kemp Hannon will retain Health, Sen. Betty Little will retain Housing, and Sen. Jim Tedisco will retain Social Services.
Action Alert: Urge Congress to Support Medicare Legislation on Therapy Caps and Rural Home Health Add-On
Calling all nursing home and home care members! Congress is soon expected to take up “Medicare extenders” legislation to address several programs and payment policies that expired at the end of 2017. Among these include the outpatient therapy cap exceptions process, which has led to the reinstatement of Part B therapy caps, and additional payments made to rural home health agencies. While LeadingAge supports improvements like repealing the Part B therapy caps and extending the rural home health add-on, we are concerned that Congress will try to pay for them by cutting Medicare reimbursement to nursing homes and home health agencies, in addition to making other changes to these payment systems. Please call or email your representatives today and urge them to consider other ways to fund improvements to the Medicare program!
LeadingAge NY Testifies at Senate Hearing on Employee Scheduling Regulations
In case you missed it, LeadingAge NY Executive Vice President Dan Heim appeared before the Senate Committee on Commerce, Economic Development, and Small Business and the Senate Administrative Regulations Review Commission last week to discuss the impact of the Department of Labor’s (DOL) proposed employee scheduling regulations. The regulations govern “call-in,” “just-in-time,” or “on-call” scheduling of workers and would expand the circumstances under which employers must provide call-in pay. Dan’s testimony urged that long term care employers be exempted from the requirements and noted the potential for adverse effects on quality of care, access to services, administrative costs, and provider finances. A recording of the hearing is available on the Senate website, with Dan’s testimony beginning at the 1 hour 55 minute mark.
Democrats Nominate Assemblywoman Mayer to Run for 37th Senate District Seat
State Democratic officials this week selected Asm. Shelley Mayer to run in a special election for the vacant seat in the 37th Senate District. The seat was formerly held by George Latimer, who took office as Westchester County Executive on Jan. 1st. In a statement following her nomination, Asm. Mayer emphasized the need for “united and strong progressive leadership in Albany.” Senate Democratic Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, meanwhile, stated that Asm. Mayer’s election would allow the Democratic Conference to move forward on “ensuring New Yorkers have access to good paying jobs, real mandate and tax relief, high-quality public education, and affordable health care.”
As LeadingAge NY previously reported, however, there is no word yet on when the Governor plans to schedule the election.
Senator Klein Faces Sexual Misconduct Allegations
Lastly, the #MeToo movement arrived in Albany late Wednesday afternoon when allegations of sexual misconduct surfaced against Sen. Jeff Klein, the leader of the chamber’s Independent Democratic Conference (IDC). The alleged incident, which involves a former IDC staffer and dates back to 2015, was first reported by HuffPost.
On Thursday, after denying the incident, Sen. Klein asked the state’s Joint Commission on Public Ethics (JCOPE) to begin an investigation. Governor Cuomo and Senate Democratic Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins likewise called for an independent investigation, while Senate Majority Leader John Flanagan acknowledged that an inquiry would be in the scope of other entities, but not the Senate.
Contacts:
Ami Schnauber, aschnauber@leadingageny.org, 518-867-8854
Jeff Diamond, jdiamond@leadingageny.org, 518-867-8821