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Budget proposal includes more money for social services

Posted August 09, 2007 11:00 pm

Dana Heupel

Advocates for seniors, disabled residents and hospitals are relieved they weren't overlooked in a proposed state budget the Illinois House passed Thursday, but some worry the amounts may not be enough.

Included is a $32 million increase for a Department on Aging program to provide in-home help for senior citizens to allow them to remain in their residences instead of going to nursing homes. The department has touted the program as growing more critical each year as the wave of baby boomers ages.

"It's where they want to live; it's where their families would like them to be, at home," said Donna Ginther, manager of state affairs for AARP Illinois.

But even though the proposed increase is nearly 11 percent over last year, it is a decrease of nearly $25 million from the amount Gov. Rod Blagojevich suggested when he released his budget plan in March. That could mean that services under the Community Care program run out before July 1, 2008, the end of the current fiscal year, Ginther said.

"Over the course of the year, additional seniors come on the program," she said, "as well as when they naturally age, they require more services."

Charles Johnson, director of the Department on Aging, told members of a House committee Wednesday that money for the program could be depleted as early as May, Ginther said.

A spokeswoman for Aging acknowledged Thursday that the department believes the money for the program will run out before the end of the fiscal year.

Ginther said Blagojevich's proposed increases also were cut for adult day programs, where seniors go to sites for physical therapy, grooming and management of medications; and for an emergency home response program that enables older Illinoisans to alert authorities electronically if they fall or need other help.

Also in the budget proposal is a 2.5 percent cost-of-doing-business increase for community agencies that serve developmentally disabled residents. Those providers and most of their employees haven't seen any pay boosts for the past two years.

"We're pleased in this environment where we had heard we weren't going to get anything," said Janet Stover, executive director of the Illinois Association of Rehabilitation Facilities.

Earlier this year, advocates had sought a 3 percent increase, but 2.5 percent will provide agencies with the flexibility to give pay raises to staff who work directly with developmentally disabled clients, Stover said.

The budget plan also includes a 3 percent cost-of-living adjustment for community providers that treat alcoholism and substance abuse.

And it contains $8 million more for some mental health agencies, $7.5 million in new money for an autism program and $990,000 to maintain the buildings at the site of the former Lincoln Developmental Center.

"It's not for an expansion but to continue services they currently provide, which isn't a lot," Rep. Gary Hannig of Litchfield, the House Democrats' chief budget negotiator, said of the LDC site.

Four 10-bed buildings have been constructed but have remained vacant. The center was closed in 2002 after problems were alleged with client care.

The proposed spending plan for the Department of Public Health adds $2.5 million for diabetes research at the University of Chicago, $1.5 million to help high-risk infants and mothers, and $5 million in additional grants to be divided equally among all local public health departments. That created some concerns for some lawmakers.

"There are a lot of us that think that's not a lot of local money" for health departments, Rep. Patti Bellock, R-Hinsdale, said during floor debate in the House.

Several lawmakers also expressed concern about whether hospitals would receive all the money they are entitled to from a Medicaid assessment program. The state levied a voluntary tax on hospitals, and that amount was used to obtain matching Medicaid funds from the federal government, which are then returned to hospitals.

The proposed '08 budget contains $1.2 billion for hospitals under the program, but $1.2 billion from last year's budget remains in limbo as part of a spending bill Blagojevich has yet to sign.

That legislation also contains pay raises for lawmakers and elected state executives, money for families of soldiers killed in Iraq and school construction funds, among other things.

Rep. Rosemary Mulligan, R-Des Plaines, worried that if Blagojevich doesn't sign the legislation soon, "we are going to have a problem paying the hospital tax money out" before the end of this month, when spending authority for '07 payments expires.

"We're reaching a point where the FY07 money is going to be a problem," she said during the House debate.

"Hospitals have been borrowing money to make payroll, and this has been a real burden," Howard Peters, senior vice president for the Illinois Hospitals and Health Systems Association, told lawmakers during a committee hearing Wednesday.

Mulligan and others suggested the proposed budget could also contain any money lost if payments to hospitals couldn't be made.

"I think all of us would urge the governor to sign that proposal as quickly as possible," Hannig responded. "We passed the supplemental. We think we've dealt with the '07 problem.

Dana Heupel can be reached at (217) 788-1518 or dana.heupel@sj-r.com.

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