Legislative Bulletin: New York Reaches ‘Conceptual’ Budget Agreement
April 28, 2023
Governor Announces ‘Conceptual’ Budget Agreement for FY 2024
Last night, Governor Hochul announced a "conceptual" $229 billion state budget agreement, reviewing the high-level deals that were made with the Legislature. As of this writing, no specific details or budget bills have been made available other than a press release and an announcement recording from the Governor’s office. While some specifics on bail reform and other issues were mentioned in the Governor’s address, much was left to be desired in the realms of health and housing.
In the statewide coordinated push for a substantial increase to the nursing home, assisted living program and adult day health care Medicaid rate, it is reported that providers may see an increase of 6.5-7.5% in the final budget. During her address, Hochul said that hospitals and nursing homes would receive the "largest rate increase in two decades" in Medicaid reimbursement rates, but she did not state any final figures. In negotiations, the Legislature had sought a 10% increase for both hospitals and nursing homes, while Hochul proposed a 5% increase for both. Provider associations as well as labor unions continue to urge that the percentages that are being floated are “wholly inadequate” to address the health care crisis facing New York.
LeadingAge New York is hearing that budget work on bills is likely to continue over the weekend, and the Assembly is scheduled to have a Democratic conference on Sunday. It is possible that budget bills may be taken up and passed on Monday, but time will tell.
Once the final health budget bill is made available, LeadingAge New York will provide an initial summary of the measures most relevant to our members. Thereafter, we will issue a comprehensive final budget memo within a week of the passage of the final budget.
While we wait for the 2023-24 Final Budget to be made final, we urge our LeadingAge New York membership to keep the pressure on the Governor and legislative leadership (Senate Maj. Leader Stewart-Cousins & Assembly Speaker Heastie) via social media. Further, members are encouraged to engage families and staff in social media activity to illustrate the widespread demand for better Medicaid reimbursement.
ACTION ALERT: Maintain Pressure on Elected Officials!
A conceptual budget agreement has been announced for the 2023-24 Fiscal Year, however, we are hearing that some health budget details remain open. Based on recent reports and rumors, a 6.5% Medicaid increase might be all that is provided to nursing homes & assisted living programs in the final budget. While this is an improvement from the original 5% proposed, we know that 6.5% is not enough for your workforce or for the people that depend on you for care.
PLEASE TAKE A MOMEMENT TO ‘LIKE’ & ‘SHARE’ THE BELOW SOCIAL MEDIA MESSAGES!!! It only takes a few clicks and will put meaningful public pressure on the Governor & Legislative Leaders to provide better funding to our state’s nursing homes! PLEASE ‘LIKE’ AND ‘SHARE’ THESE MESSAGES NOW & TAG THE GOVERNOR IN YOUR RE-POST!
- LeadingAge NY Facebook Post
- LeadingAge NY Twitter Post
- LeadingAge NY LinkedIn Post
If you would like to post some social media messages of your own tagging the Governor & Leaders, additional messages and graphics can be found here.
Example: 60,000 nursing home residents depend on Medicaid to pay for their care, but the rates have not been updated since 2007. How can we expect our workforce & access to improve without proper investment? @GovKathyHochul – nursing homes need a 10% Medicaid increase! NY must do better. Add a graphic like this or this!
Thank you for your advocacy at this critical time!
Role of the Nurse Bill Moves to Senate Finance Committee
This week, LeadingAge New York priority legislation the “Role of the Nurse”, was advanced out of the Senate Health Committee and referred to Senate Finance committee. LeadingAge New York strongly supports this bill, A.5670 (Solages)/S.5471 (Rivera), which would allow nurses that are employed by an Adult Care Facility (ACF) the option to provide limited, episodic nursing services to residents that need temporary assistance.
On occasion, a resident of an ACF may have a straight-forward nursing need, such as the application of a topical ointment in place that is difficult to reach. In these cases, today the facility that doesn’t have a higher-level licensure must bring a home care agency in to serve the resident, even if they have nurses on-site. Since such basic services are typically not covered by Medicare, the resident must often pay for these services out of pocket. Additionally, right now a nurse in an ACF cannot conduct an assessment on an individual to possibly prevent an emergency room visit. As a result, there are many unnecessary visits to the Emergency Room (ER) that could have been diverted if the on-site nurse had been able to utilize their skills and assess the situation.
This bill provides a common sense and person-centered approach to ACF and assisted living services, which is also consistent with federal and state policy. The legislation makes it clear that residents who need a higher level of care will still indeed get a higher level of care if they truly need it, but also allows unnecessary hospitalizations to be more easily avoided.
If your state legislators sit on the Senate Finance Committee or the Assembly Health Committee, we encourage you to call their offices and express your support of this common-sense legislation.
LeadingAge & LeadingAge New York Coronavirus Resources
LeadingAge NY continues to closely follow all COVID-19 news and we are doing our best to keep members informed of updates, recommendations and guidelines from the Department of Health (DOH).
LeadingAge NY and LeadingAge National Member resources are linked below.
LeadingAge NY Coronavirus Resources
LeadingAge NY COVID-19 Weekly Update calls – Mondays at 11 a.m. Click here to join the call from your computer, android or apple device. Or you can join the call by dialing in: 877 853 5257 (Toll Free); Webinar ID: 852 964 255.
LeadingAge National Coronavirus Policy Updates – Mondays and Wednesdays at 3:30 p.m. Past call recordings are available here and you can register here for future calls.
Contact: Sarah Daly; 518.867.8845; sdaly@leadingageny.org