Page 12 - MSN_384_AprilMay

PAGE 12 ALL ABOUT MONTANA
The Perfect
Storm
A WORKFORCE CRISIS IN
MONTANA’S LONGTERM
CARE FACILITIES
BY AARON PARRETT
Daryl Toews serves on the board of
Valley View Home, a 96-bed skilled nursing
home in Glasgow, Montana. He’s concerned
the long-term care facility is going to have
to close.
“Our operating costs are about $100,000
a month more than we can afford,” he said.
“We’ve scraped together some funds to
cover it, but it just isn’t enough. If we can’t
cover it, we’re talking about having to close
the doors.”
Toews, a former Republican state sena-
tor from Glasgow, is well-acquainted with
the gears and levers of state government.
“Governor Gianforte is in total denial
that he’s got a problem,” he said.
What prompted this crisis? A perfect
storm of the COVID-19 pandemic and a shift
in Montana’s state government.
Rose Hughes, the Executive Director
of the Montana Health Care Association
(MHCA), spells out the particulars in a
response she wrote to Gov. Gianforte’s
January 14 open letter to MHCA.
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“directed an additional $40 per Medicaid the long-term problem down the road, but
In March of 2020, then-Governor Bullock
He anticipates the Legislature will fix
member per day to combat the rising cost of he said, in the meantime, the increase is so
health care during the pandemic,” Hughes
big, the local facilities can’t handle it.
wrote. “The Gianforte administration ended “The current administration thought,
the payments May 31st, 2021—even though when COVID was over, everything would
the pandemic was not over.” go back to normal—but it hasn’t,” he said.
In addition, she explained, Quarantine
Incentive Payments totaling more than $8 Meanwhile, Valley View Home needs that
additional $100,000 a month to keep its
million dollars had been made available doors open.
under Bullock, but “these payments were That works out to $1.6 million they’ll
ended in February 2021 even though facil- need while waiting for the Montana legis-
ities continued to experience higher costs lature to meet again in 2023.
associated with quarantine and isolation.” Meanwhile, the MHCA is advocating
Hughes acknowledged the Gianforte for the current state administration to use
administration did provide a “one-time- federal funding from President Biden’s
only” American Rescue Plan Act payment of American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), to employ
$15 million, “to support routine activities and a short-term solution.
promote staff recruitment and retention.” “Millions of dollars of funds received
The problem was that the one-time from the federal government are specifi-
payment replaced the $40 per-patient, per- cally available for ‘hero pay’ for our direct
day Medicaid rate increase and was “only care workers as well as for recruitment
sufficient to cover about five months of the and retention bonuses,” she said. “This
$40 per day.” is the type of funding we need to assure
Worse, once that money ran out in workers are available to care for the elderly
October of 2021, according to Hughes, facil- Montanans we serve.”
ities were on their own. She said they now Both Hughes and Toews indicate the
need to depend solely on “their ‘normal’ problem is urgent. “We have a direct care
revenues—including a Medicaid rate of workforce crisis,” Hughes said, “Funds are
$211 total per patient day, while costs have available to help with this crisis, but the
increased to more than $300 per day.” administration continues to say no to these
Toews concurred. “We can’t pay com- workers.” MSN
petitive wages to keep staff in the facilities.
So you have to go to contract labor, which The author reached out to Gov. Gianforte’s office seeking
can be three times the usual cost,” he said. comment on this issue. At the time this publication went
“We’re having a dickens of a time hiring.” to press, his office had not responded.
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