Assembly Minority Leader Will Barclay (R,C,I-Pulaski), Assemblyman Josh Jensen (R,C,I-Greece) and their colleagues in the Assembly Minority Conference are calling on Gov. Kathy Hochul, Health Commissioner Mary Bassett, and Greg Olsen, acting director of the New York State Office for the Aging, to take immediate action regarding the wellbeing of residents living in the state’s long-term care facilities. As such, members of the Conference wrote a letter  calling for the state’s “Reimagining Long-Term Care Task Force” to finally meet.

The task force was created to study long-term care services in the state and to provide recommendations to the governor and both houses of the Legislature. However, despite a legal requirement to do so—the task force’s creation was signed into law on Dec. 22, 2021, and went into effect Thursday, Oct. 27, 2022—it has still not begun its work.

“Considering the many questions and concerns surrounding the state’s long-term care programs, there is no excuse for this task force to sit idle. It has a statutory requirement to meet, address the obvious flaws plaguing residents of these facilities and to make recommendations for action. We are calling for this task force to meet now, so it can begin to fix this broken system,” said Leader Barclay. 

“New York’s health care system is currently on the precipice, and every day that New York state goes without acting is one day closer to failure to provide critical care for millions of people,” said Assemblyman Jensen. “The state’s failure to call for an immediate meeting of the ‘Reimagining Long-Term Care Task Force’ to begin planning a pathway to improved nursing home outcomes shows a disregard for our state’s seniors.”

Recently, a Western New York nursing home was accused of widespread fraud and neglect, prompting enforcement actions by the state attorney general. Additionally, it is still unclear exactly what happened during the COVID-19 outbreak, and an expected report from the governor’s office detailing those failures has also yet to be produced.

Further still, due to serious staffing concerns in nursing homes, hospitals have been unable to effectively discharge patients to more medically-appropriate care settings. This, coupled with inadequate Medicaid funding levels leading to low staffing and insufficient infrastructure, has created serious gaps in health care for one of New York’s most vulnerable populations. 

By bringing together long-term care stakeholders as part of this task force, including Assembly Minority Conference appointee Colleen Rose, vice president of Long-Term Care at Rochester Regional Health, the state can immediately begin to plan a path to better serve residents living in nursing homes and provide recommendations for the upcoming 2023 Legislative Session.

A copy of the letter sent to Gov. Hochul, Commissioner Bassett and Acting Director Olsen is available here.