Alliance Note: Yesterday, Alliance CEO Harvey Rosenthal testified at the NYS Legislature’s Mental Hygiene budget hearing. Harvey’s testimony reinforced the chorus of advocates and providers calling for a 3.2% Cost-of-Living-Adjustment for our workforce. While we are thankful to Governor Hochul for her focus on improving the mental health system through new models of service, expansions of effective programs, and other investments, we cannot fulfil the goals of this focus without addressing our workforce crisis.
We were especially heartened by the bipartisan support for the 3.2% COLA from the legislature. Many of the legislators who attended the hearing agreed much more must be done to recruit and retain workers in the field and voiced their desire to include the desired 3.2% in the final budget, but we must keep pushing for what we know our workforce needs at minimum.
The Alliance will continue to advocate for the 3.2% COLA and other needed workforce investments. Attend our New York City Regional Forum in Brooklyn tomorrow to learn more ways you can join us in this fight to save our workforce! Register for the forum here. We’ll also have more forums in Long Island and the North County this month.
You can also join our fight for the 3.2% COLA by coming to Albany for our Annual Legislative Day on March 5th. We will be hosting the largest COLA rally of the year to make sure the legislature knows just how critical saving our workforce is to us. Keep an eye out for bus registrations which will be announced this week! See below for more information from yesterday’s budget hearing.
Decades of Flat Budgets Leave Mental Health Workforce Vastly Underfunded, Advocates Say
Amanda D’Ambrosio | Crain’s Health Pulse | February 14, 2024
Lawmakers and advocates called for a 3.2% cost-of-living adjustment for direct support providers in mental health, substance use and disability services at a budget hearing Tuesday.
Mental health, substance use and disability advocates testified at a legislative budget hearing on Tuesday about what they say is a lack of funding in the governor’s executive budget for the mental hygiene workforce.
Gov. Kathy Hochul’s proposed budget includes a 1.2% cost-of-living adjustment for providers — an increase that advocates say is not enough to solve workforce challenges that prohibit them from providing adequate care.
Instead, advocates are pushing for a 3.2% cost-of-living adjustment for direct support providers who work in mental health, substance use and disability services, as well as a $500 million workforce investment to offset years of flat funding that have set providers behind.
State agencies have lauded the governor’s dedication to the mental health crisis, noting that the proposed COLA represents the third consecutive year that Hochul has boosted funding for providers. Last year’s budget included a 4% COLA, and the budget the year before that included a 5.4% increase.
Hochul’s proposed 1.2% COLA translates to an additional $120 million — and $196 million with federal matching funds — for programs which operate through the Office of Mental Health, the Office of Addiction Services and Supports and the Office for People with Developmental Disabilities, according to the executive budget. The state also plans to adjust base rates paid for specific services for OPWDD that could result in an additional $350 million for providers, said Kerri Neifeld, commissioner of OPWDD.
“We know that there is no single solution to the current workforce crisis,” Neifeld said, adding that the agency is pursuing multiple pathways to recruit and retain direct service providers.
But advocates say that the proposed pay increases are not enough to help them provide adequate compensation to mental health, substance use and disability workers, resulting in high turnover and workforce shortages. Glenn Liebman, CEO of the Mental Health Association in New York State, said that despite Hochul’s mental health investments the workforce remains “largely unaddressed,” and low pay has led many workers to pursue jobs in retail and food service industries.
“You can go across the street to McDonald’s and make more than you can as a direct care worker in our fields,” Liebman said during Tuesday’s budget hearing.
Hochul has increased cost-of-living pay more than any other governor in the last 17 years, Liebman said. But because of flat funding for nearly two decades, mental health providers have received 34% less funding than they were owed in that time period, he added.
Substance use disorder and disability advocates echoed calls for higher pay to solve workforce shortages. Mike Alvaro, president of New York Disability Advocates, said in his testimony that there are 20,000 unfilled positions for direct support providers who serve New Yorkers with intellectual and developmental disabilities. The statewide vacancy rate for disability providers totals 17.5%, and turnover rates exceeded 30%, he added.
Anne Sullivan, commissioner of mental health, said that the state’s recently awarded Medicaid 1115 waiver amendment includes some solutions to the workforce crisis, such as expanded loan repayment programs and pipeline training programs.
Workforce issues were not the only challenges that advocates raised during Tuesday’s budget hearing. Legislators called attention to the state’s allocation of more than $300 million in opioid settlement funds to date — an allocation that OASAS Commissioner Chinazo Cunningham said was the most rapid disbursement of settlements compared to any other state.
Lawmakers questioned how much of those funds were actually in the hands of providers to pay for prevention, treatment, harm reduction and workforce — a question that Cunningham could not answer directly. She said that OASAS has distributed roughly $15 million a quarter. The state Assembly and Senate will devise their own budget proposals before voting on a final budget, which is due in April.