Last week was filled with activity at the statehouse. On Tuesday, March 8, 2022, the House Health and Human Services heard testimony on SB 453.
This is the bill that is referred to as “Open the pipeline for CNA Training” and can be viewed here.
Time stamp: 1:53:22 begins the hearing with the revisor explaining the bill. Linda MowBray KHCA/KCAL President/CEO’s testimony begins at 1:55:42. Robert Miller, Senior Vice-President of Development with Comfort Care’s testimony begins at 2:02:40. Shannon Lager, Executive Director, Medicalodges’ testimony begins at 2:18:22. The question and answer portion begins at time stamp 2:39:20.
The committee chair, Representative Brenda Landwehr instructed the conferees on both sides of the bill to work together to develop compromise language. KDADS mediated these calls and new language was developed and agreed upon. Over the weekend, new language was proposed that turned all of our compromises on its ear. Thanks to the excellent work of the CNA workgroup lead by Robert Miller, was able to quickly revisit the language and a compromise was again reach. This was reported to Representative Landwehr on Monday, March 14, 2022 and the Chairwoman plans to work the bill on Tuesday, March 15, 2022 at 1:30 barring any holdups from the revisor’s office. You can watch the proceedings live by clicking here.
On Tuesday, March 8, 2022, our legislative champions came out in force as the House appropriations Committee heard the recommendations from the House Social Services Budget Committee. Chairman Will Carpenter knocked it out of the park with his support for fully funding Kansas nursing homes at the statutorily level of using the most current three years of cost report data and inflating through the mid-point of the fiscal year. This comes with a price-tag of $34,814,982 State General Funds or $86,733,887 in All Funds. The Governor’s budget only recommended $8,630,100 State General Funds or $21,500,000 in All Funds. Click here to see Representative Carpenter’s presentation. Time stamp 9:58:30
Representative Carpenter wasn’t the only champion for us in that hearing. Representative Brenda Landwehr, Representative Barbara Ballard, and Committee chair Representative Troy Waymaster advocated for fully funding nursing homes. Please thank them when you have the opportunity.
For our Assisted living and Home Plus communities who provide HCBS services, a 10% increase for the FE waiver was also added to the budget. This would take the per unit reimbursement from $4.49 to $4.94.
We will undoubtedly need you to reach out to support the budget. We will alert you when that action is needed.
Should you have questions, please contact me.
