New York State Budget Update

What is Happening:

This week, the Governor released his proposed 2017-2018 Executive Budget. Below is a brief update. Please stay tuned for more details as they become available and how you can get involved.  Of note:  

• Over $13 million in cuts and cost shifts affecting the State Office for the Aging (SOFA).
• Proposed language that threatens Title XX Funds that are used to fund senior centers.
• Last time this was proposed several years ago, upwards of 100 senior centers would have been closed if the proposal went through. LiveOn NY was part of concerted effort to fight it then, and we will do so again vigilantly.  
• Language to prevent financial exploitation of older adults, an issue LiveOn NY has been working on for several years. 
• The addition of $125M in capital funding for affordable senior housing, another key issue for LiveOn NY.

What We Are Doing:

Leaders from LiveOn NY, The Association on Aging in New York and LifeSpan will meet with key Senators and Assemblymembers on February 7 in Albany to discuss the potential impact of the proposed budget and the the importance of fully funding aging services.  We will also highlight our $177 Million Multi-Year Budget Request. The goal of our request focuses on modernizing long term care services and supports for older New Yorkers.  Click here to review our budget proposal.

What You Can Do:

1. Join LiveOn NY in Albany on Tuesday February 7 and meet with your legislators to discuss your program and the Aging Services Budget Request.  If you are planning on going to Albany, please contact Andrea Cianfrani at LiveOn NY at acianfrani@liveon-ny.org or 212-398-6565x233 so we can measure our impact and provide you with information and talking points for your meetings.  
2. Set up meetings in February with your state legislators in the district offices to discuss your aging programs.  We are counting on your help and  It is important to meet with your legislators this year to be part of LiveOn NY’s presentation of the budget agenda.  We will be providing talking points and questions to ask your legislators - stay tuned.
3. Call your legislators’ offices and tell them to support aging services and to prevent cuts, and send them the link to the budget ask.
4. Invite legislators to your program in February so they can see your important work and the need for funding and why any cuts would be so devastating..
5. Let LiveOn NY know of the events you are holding, meetings you have and key relationships you have developed with legislators or who are supportive of aging programs so we can continue to build a supportive network. Contact Andrea Cianfrani at LiveOn NY at acianfrani@liveon-ny.org or 212-398-6565x233 

Important Links:
How to find information on your legislators:
Click here to find your New York State Assemblymember
Click here to find your New York State Senator

Event: Winter Theatre Benefit

Join us for Dinner and the highly anticipated production of Othello!

Wednesday, January 11th from 5:30pm-10:00pm

NYTIMES REVIEW: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/20/theater/david-oyelowo-othello-new-york-theater-workshop.html

ORDER YOUR TICKETS NOW - SPACE IS LIMITED 

Tickets are $250.00 per person

About the Show:

NYTW Usual Suspect and Tony Award winner Sam Gold returns to NYTW to direct David Oyelowo (Royal Shakespeare Company’s The Histories, Selma, Queen of Katwe) in the title role and Daniel Craig (Betrayal, Spectre) as ‘Iago’ in William Shakespeare’s Othello.
 
Othello runs approximately 3 hours and 10 minutes with one 15-minute intermission.
 
Single tickets for OTHELLO are sold out.

Click here for more information!

ALERT: Off the Fiscal Cliff Campaign

LiveOn NY is starting a new Campaign - OFF THE FISCAL CLIFF - and we need your help today. Here are the details:

• What we are advocating for: 1) Continued outreach efforts to spread awareness about the NY Rent Freeze Program AND 2) A policy change within the NY Rent Freeze Program so that rental costs are capped at 1/3 of a senior's income and for those already enrolled - a rollback to the 1/3 level.

• Purpose: LiveOn NY works closely with key partners including the NYC Department of Finance, Department for the Aging & Human Resource Administration to make sure each eligible older person is aware of the NY Rent Freeze Program. The public-private partnerships that are addressing under-enrollment in the program are a critical way to spread the awareness. We want to ensure these efforts continue and expand outreach, as we know that seniors are overburdened in housing costs. Often paying more than 50% of their income on rent, whether they are enrolled in NY Rent Freeze (SCRIE/DRIE) or not. Because the Rent Freeze Program is one of the key tools to preserve affordable seniors housing AND allows older adults' to remain at home as they age - we must ensure that NYC improve its policies to help seniors off the fiscal cliff.

• Who we are targeting: New York City and State Elected Officials, Policymakers and other key stakeholders

What you can do!

SIGN ON TO THE CAMPAIGN TODAY (Click here)

FORWARD THE SIGN-ON LINK TO YOUR CONTACTS

SHARE ON SOCIAL MEDIA (info below)

More Facts about the issue:

• 200,000 older New Yorkers are on waiting lists for affordable senior housing, for an average of 7 years
• 4 out of 10 seniors report not knowing about NY Rent Freeze
• Too many seniors find out about their eligibility during an affordability crisis
• Almost 60% of seniors who are enrolled in SCRIE continue to experience heavy rent burden, with average annual incomes between $11,000 and $12,000. They find out about the benefit too late and cannot have the benefit “rolled-back” to an affordable level.
• NYC must rollback and cap rents at 1/3 of household income to help seniors off the fiscal cliff.
• Click here to check out our infographics highlighting the alarming SCRIE statistics.

Sign our Campaign. Share on Social Media. Be an Advocate

TESTIMONY: City Council Aging Committee Hearing on Funding for Core Aging Services

Testimony: City Council Aging Committee Hearing on Funding for Core Aging Services note: acrobat format

New York City Council
Committee on Aging, Council Member Margaret Chin, Chair
November 17, 2016

Thank you Chairwoman Chin and the Aging Committee for holding this hearing to discuss the importance of supporting core community based senior services.   Thank you also recognizing the valuable contributions senior centers, programs and agencies provide and how their work to engage the community makes New York a better place to age.   LiveOn NY also commends Chairwoman Chin for promoting FY2018 as the Year of the Senior.

LiveOn NY’s community-based aging services members have been on the front lines of serving the diverse population of older New Yorkers for many years.  They offer core senior services and programs funded through the Department for the Aging  (DFTA) that directly promote social interaction and prevent isolation. Programs funded by DFTA are the only long-term care services available for elderly New Yorkers above the Medicaid level.  These services are most often the only safety net for low income seniors.

Inexcusably, the funding allocated to DFTA for aging programs year after year does not reflect the reality of the needs of New York City’s seniors or their caregivers.  Investing in these core programs is vital to the health of our city.  Further, investing in salary parity for all senior services programs is necessary to sustain this vital system.  Thus, LiveOn NY respectfully submits this testimony to highlight the need and importance of full funding baselined core senior services to adequate address the current, unmet and future need of seniors and their caregivers

The City Must Provide a Fair Share of Baselined Funding Core Senior Services
LiveOn NY has strongly advocated year after year for baselined funding for culturally competent neighborhood based services to allow agencies on the front lines to serve the diverse population of older New Yorkers.  These core services, many of them accessed through the city’s network of 250 senior centers, are vital in preventing isolation and also addressing mental and physical health issues, as reported in a recent DFTA and Fordham University study by Manoj Pardasani and Cathy Berkman titled Senior Center Evaluation Report.

Core Senior Services include:

• Elder Abuse Victims Assistance
• Adult Day Services
• Social Workers in Senior Centers and Senior Housing buildings
• Senior Center rent (space)
• Transportation
• 6th weekend congregate meal

• Neighborhood Senior Centers and Innovative Senior Centers
• Case Management
• Home Care
• Caregiver Supports
• Per meal reimbursements
• NORCs

While we appreciate salary parity reached for case management agencies, it is time to also bring salaries into line for all workers in the aging network. The workforce is comprised largely of women of color, immigrants and other low income workers. As the Mayor leads the way to equality in this city, those on the front lines every day assisting older adults should get their fair share of salary parity.

There are two pressing issues that have plagued the delivery of these core senior services.  First, funding for core senior services hasn’t kept pace with demand and inflation for many years.  The question is not if, but when will the Administration adequately fund core senior services and allocate seniors their Fair Share of the city budget.  Seniors have been waiting long enough. There have been waiting lists for case management and home care for well over a decade. Adult day services funding, $2.3 million at the time, was eliminated almost a decade ago. Through advocacy we’ve scratched back only $950,000, all City Council discretionary money. The administration actually cut $600,000 in adult day money a few years ago. Funding for NORCs has not kept pace for many years. Last year, we began advocating for $4 million for caregiver supports. We won zero. It is clear that there is still a mountain to climb to get traction within the administration to fund actual waiting lists and other critical aging services. Through our Fair Share Budget Campaign, LiveOn NY questions why this is the situation given the demographic shift going on in our city. 

As noted a letter to Mayor de Blasio on May 26, 2016 during the FY17 budget process and which was signed by a large number of City Council Members under the leadership of Council Members Chin and Vallone, while the elderly population is the fastest growing demographic in New York City, DFTA’s budget in FY16 was less than one-half of 1 percent of the City’s $78.5 billion adopted budget.  Additionally, DFTA receives only 2% of all human services funding. Current resources do not allow senior services staff to connect with the broad array and ever changing immigrant groups and other diverse populations.  It also does not allow them to even come close to addressing the unmet need.

Specifically relating to funding for Neighborhood Senior Centers, as reported in LiveOn NY’s 2010 Senior Center study, senior centers are grossly underfunded.  In that report, LiveOn NY recommended a budget of $750,000  to be the starting point from which to consider the bottom line budgets based on size for each senior center, which is a recommendation that could be prorated on the size of the center, plus meeting the rental needs.  Both Neighborhood Senior Centers and all Innovative Senior Centers must be funded to keep pace with the growing needs of older adults. 

The second pressing issue plaguing senior services is the Administration’s repeated failure to baseline core senior services.  The lack of investment seniors through baselined funding requires City Council step in to close funding gaps for core senior programs, program after program, year after year. The Administration’s repeated failure to baseline core senior services also results in an unstable and unsustainable network struggling to address the current, unmet and growing need for these vital core services.  The lack of baselining has led to loss of services, late receipt of funds, and an inability to plan, directly hurting seniors and caregivers.  This is evident by the repeated accruing waitlists in services such as Case Management and Home Care.  No senior should languish on a waitlist for services.  Waitlists for core senior services as an accepted practice must end.  It is far past time for the Administration to adequately baseline funding for core senior services so that we can all work together to make New York a better place to age.

ALERT: LiveOn NY November Home Care Funding Action Alert

Printable Verison for this Alert note: acrobat format
Home Care Waitlists Report note: acrobat format
Tracking Form - Online Version
Tracking Form - Download Version note: acrobat format

Model Letters note: acrobat format
English
Spanish
Chinese

AN ASTOUNDING 500 HOMEBOUND SENIORS ARE ON WAITING LISTS
FOR HOME CARE FUNDED BY THE DEPARTMENT FOR THE AGING (DFTA)!

IT’S TIME TO SEND MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO A STRONG MESSAGE – 
AS THE MAYOR FOR ALL NEW YORKERS, YOU HAVE A RESPONSIBILITY
TO FULLY FUND HOME CARE IMMEDIATELY IN THE CITY’S NOVEMBER PLAN! 
WHY WAS FUNDING WAS CUT FROM $4.3 MILLION TO $2 MILLION?

What is happening:

• LiveOn NY recently surveyed case management agencies to document the waiting lists – 500 homebound seniors waiting and the number can only grow! CLICK HERE to see the waitlists.
• In August, DFTA notified case management agencies that there would be a freeze on home care hours. LiveOn NY’s understanding of this situation is that DFTA ran out of hours because there were problems allocating the hours around the city and then a budget cut to the home care program. That means there will be 10 months left to the fiscal year with no home care!
• In FY 2015-16 there was $4.3 million in home care. These funds came from City Council so were discretionary and only good for one year.
• In the current fiscal year, FY2016-17, there’s only $2 million. That’s almost a 50% cut in funds. The funds came from the Mayor’s office. The funds are good for only one year. This is called the “budget dance” – placing lives of 500 homebound seniors at risk.
• Very soon, in mid-November, Mayor de Blasio will release his “November Plan”.  In this plan the Mayor can add or reduce funding. This means the Mayor can make sure the full $4.3 million is added to DFTA’s budget and “baselined” (made permanent). 

Action you can take:

• Take part in LiveOn NY’s Letter Writing Campaign to urge the Mayor to fully fund home care immediately. When you’re age 80+, you can’t wait.
• Timing is crucial – mail letters by November 22.
• Senior Centers and programs can urge seniors to participate by following these directions:

1. Print out and share this alert with seniors at your programs as soon as possible.
2. CLICK HERE to print out copies of the model letters, which are available in English, Chinese and Spanish.  Seniors can simply sign the letters.
3. Collect letters and mail all letters in bulk by November 22 to: Mayor de Blasio, City Hall, New York, NY 10007.
4. CLICK HERE to complete and send the Tracking Form to LiveOn NY so we can measure our impact.  You can email the Tracking Form as an attachment to acianfrani@liveon-ny.org or mail to LiveOn NY 49 West 45th Street, 7th Floor, New York, NY 10036.

We know that the remarkable aging network, all of you, will not allow homebound seniors to sit on waiting lists. We need to work together to stand up for those who can’t advocate for themselves! You’ve done this before and we know you will do it again. Thank you.

For further information, please contact Bobbie Sackman, Associate Executive Director of Public Policy, (212) 398-6565, x226 or bsackman@liveon-ny.org or Andrea Cianfrani, Deputy Director of Public Policy, (212) 398-6565 x233 or acianfrani@liveon-ny.org

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FUND HOME CARE CAMPAIGN
TRACKING FORM OF LETTERS SENT TO MAYOR DE BLASIO
NOVEMBER 2016