Senate Republicans call for special session to reverse cuts to nine nursing homes, fearing closures, layoffs, displaced residents

September 6, 2019

Article as it appeared in the Hartford Courant

To stave off the potential closing of nine nursing homes facing funding cuts, Senate Republicans on Thursday called on Democratic leaders in the General Assembly to support a repeal of those cuts in a special legislative session this fall.

Union leaders, the nursing home industry and individual Democratic and Republican lawmakers have pushed back against cuts of more than $5 million slated for the nine homes ⁠— targeted because the state says they have vacancy rates of 30 percent of more.

Thursday, the 14-member Senate Republican Caucus wrote to Democratic leaders, asking for support to strike the cuts from the $40 billion state budget. Some political sniping followed the request.

The senators noted the budget was crafted by Gov. Ned Lamont and the Democratic majority.

The Senate Republicans said Democrats who now oppose the cuts are hypocrites.

“Those calls ring hollow because the same majority party that crafted this policy could secure a special legislative session so that action can be taken and the budget can be fixed,” they wrote.

House Speaker Joe Aresimowicz, D-Berlin, said he appreciated the willingness of the caucus members “to come to the table to help assist with this issue, considering they never put forward a balanced budget during the legislative session.”

Aresimowicz said House leaders have been “monitoring this situation closely and my office has been in touch with both the administration and representatives of the nursing homes. We hope this can be resolved in a way that achieves the overall policy goals without impacting seniors or their care providers.”

But he did not address the Republicans’ request for a special session on the funding cuts.

Senate President Pro Tempore Martin Looney, D-New Haven, was also noncommittal.

“Democrats are considering a number of issues for a potential September special session,” he said. “We appreciate the Republicans’ new interest in funding Medicaid for nursing homes after failing to offer a budget during the 2019 session.”

“Offering an alternative budget would have provided them with an opportunity to forthrightly state their spending priorities in comparison with the adopted budget. … We do remain open to good faith discussions on this and other issues.”

Democratic leaders and Lamont have said the drop in demand for nursing homes and a shift to in-home care motivated the policy. Nearly 70 nursing homes have closed here since 1995.

But the GOP Senators said the policy “disregards the serious and traumatic consequences closures would have on vulnerable nursing home residents.”

Several hundred people could be pushed into communities that aren’t equipped to care for them, the senators wrote. And these communities would be further hurt by the economic impact of several hundred nursing home workers possibly losing their jobs.

“To make matters worse, the state budget passed by Democrats also reduces funding for the Connecticut Home Care Program by $7 million annually,” the Republican senators wrote. “Therefore, the overall impact of your budget both hurts those receiving care in nursing homes, and makes it harder for people displaced by potential nursing home closures to successfully age in place.”

The GOP senators said they would work with Democrats to find $5.3 million — the amount of the cuts to the homes — elsewhere in the budget.

The nine nursing homes are now prepared to shed as many as 500 unused beds, up from an offer of 400, said Matthew Barrett, CEO of the Connecticut Association of Health Care Facilities.

Barrett said removing the threat of closings, layoffs and transfers of residents would lead to productive discussions about the future of the nursing home industry in the state.

“There is every reason to believe that a bipartisan consensus can be achieved.” Barrett said, adding that the nursing home industry understands the need for a “rebalancing” and “right-sizing” of the nursing centers.

“Our association now estimates as many as 500 nursing home beds can be removed over the next several months if centers are given the opportunity to avoid these severe Medicaid cuts,” he said.

Lamont’s chief spokesman, Max Reiss, said the administration has been working on ways “to minimize the impact on current residents of the affected nursing homes.”

Reiss said the nine homes can take advantage of an appeal process and apply for a “hardship rate” in light of the Medicaid cuts.

Reiss said there are more than 3,000 excess nursing home beds in Connecticut — a figure hotly disputed by the nursing home industry.