Kasich outlines budget’s impact on seniors

Photos: Governor Kasich talks with seniors

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By Katie Wedell, Staff Writer Updated 11:41 PM Monday, April 11, 2011

VANDALIA — Proposed changes in the way nursing homes and home health care solutions are funded will save the state money while increasing choices and quality of care for Ohio’s seniors, Gov. John Kasich said Monday.

Kasich, along with Director of the Ohio Department of Aging Bonnie Kantor-Burman, visited the Vandalia Senior Center to outline the changes in the governor’s proposed budget that affect senior care.

“We want everyone who has a health issue to have the most independence with the best care at the lowest cost,” Kasich said.

The governor stressed that the plan is about creating efficiencies, not making cuts. He said the default has previously been to send recovering seniors from the hospital to a nursing home, even though home care is less expensive for the taxpayer and most people would prefer to be in their homes.

Doug McGarry, executive director for the Dayton region of the Ohio Area Agencies on Aging said many in the industry are happy with the concept of what the governor has proposed, but perplexed by some of the specific funding cuts.

Kantor-Burman said the governor’s plan will expand the Passport program, Ohio’s largest home and community-based program for long-term care, by at least 4,000 members in the next two years, with no waiting list.

But while the program will expand, the funding will be cut. The plan calls for cutting monthly per member funding for Passport by $33.4 million in 2012 and $65.4 million in 2013, according to a study by the Cleveland-based Center for Community Solutions.

McGarry said this amounts to reducing services for the people who are already saving taxpayers an average of $40,000 a year per person by choosing home care over nursing home care.

“If you take too many services from home care, at what point does the caregiver give up and put Mom or Dad in a nursing home,” he said.

Other opponents, including one skeptical audience member, have questioned how the governor’s budget can possibly erase the state’s deficit without increasing taxes.

“Raising taxes is not an option. If you drive up the cost of doing business, people will leave,” Kasich said. “I think we have enough efficiencies in the budget to be able to cover (additional members).”

Kasich said money for the Passport expansion will come from combining the state’s budget for nursing homes and home care so that money can be shifted more efficiently as patients’ needs change.

“This is not an attack on the nursing home industry,” he said, but added, “if there are fewer people in nursing homes then we can shift that money.”

Audience member Gene A. Geaslen, executive director of Grace Brethren Village retirement community in Englewood, raised concern about diminished quality of care due to cuts. He said he will soon be forced to cut benefits for his staff.

Kantor-Burman said a new funding formula for nursing homes will designate a greater percentage of money for quality measures. She also the state is working toward a unified, statewide training program to ensure quality home health care workers have more opportunities for advancement and recognition.

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