As the dust settled on the 2015 legislative session, an additional $369 million was included in the budget reconciliation bill, otherwise known as the Christmas Tree bill, Senate Bill 5507.
The Legislature restored $1.8 million in funding for Options Counseling for Seniors, found $20 million for integrated housing for people recovering from mental illness and addictions, and came through with $200 million in bonding for the Knight Cancer Institute.
“Now that they have met their challenge, that money will be released,” House Speaker Tina Kotek, D-Portland, explained to The Lund Report, noting the money represents what was promised in 2014.
The details of SB 5507 were hammered out in the powerful Capital Construction Subcommittee of the Committee on Ways & Means, but the final votes were approved 24-6 in the Senate and 55-3 in the House.
The $20 million for housing makes good on a proposal put forward by the National Alliance on Mental Illness - Oregon and the Oregon Residential Provider Association to construct apartment housing across the state for people with behavioral health problems.
Only 20 percent of the units will be used for this population; the remainder will go to the community at-large -- doubly reducing the state’s housing shortage and allowing people with mental illness to live alongside their neighbors. The projects will be paid for with lottery bond proceeds.
These dollars will help Oregon comply with the U.S. Department of Justice, which has been concerned the state’s been housing too many people with mental illness in state institutions when other options could be made available, in violation of the American Disabilities Act.
“That’ll make a huge difference across the state,” Kotek said.
The end-budget bill also allocated $3 million in lottery bond money for Trillium Family Services to build a 16-bed facility for teenagers in the Secure Adolescent Inpatient Program, replacing an outdated treatment center in Corvallis. The program serves adolescents who have the most difficult mental health challenges, including those referred by the Oregon Youth Authority and Juvenile Psychiatric Security Review Board.
HB 5507 included an order that $3.5 million of the $6 million be spent on increasing provider rates for people who need addictions treatment.
The budget bill also put the Department of Human Services on notice that the $26.7 million increase in higher rates to assist people with intellectual and developmental disabilities be spent on raises for direct care staff -- specifying at least a 4 percent raise. Those providers will be called back to the Legislature in 2016 to report on their progress.
Raises for these providers had been the retiring wish of longtime AFSCME lobbyist Ralph Groener, who complained that abysmal wages -- sometimes as low as minimum wage -- resulted in extremely high turnover, which in turn led to poor care by workers cycling in and out.
He complained to The Lund Report that despite an increase in rates two years ago, some of the agencies, including Albertina Kerr, had not shared those dollars with the staff people caring for this vulnerable population.
Options counseling, a priority for Rep. Nancy Nathanson, D-Eugene, will help seniors determine their long-term care needs -- from home care agencies to assisted living and adult foster care. The program is administered through the Aging and Disability Resource Connection.
The squaring up of the budget amounted to an additional $9.8 million for the Department of Human Services, on top of its approved $10.7 billion budget, and another $11.1 million for the Oregon Health Authority, above its $19.5 billion budget.
The bulk of the new money to the Oregon Health Authority -- $10 million -- will provide grants to safety-net clinics for children, including school-based health centers, federally qualified health centers and rural health centers.
The budget bill also included $130,000 to the Department of Transportation to fund the Seniors and People with Disabilities Transportation Program to help counties, tribes and transit districts with transportation, particularly in rural areas.
