“I’m not a hero, I just did what needed to be done.”

Pamela McCarty, home care aide, sits in a police car after being arrested for protesting DSHS unilateral cuts and protecting her client.

-Pam McCarty

This week, homecare members across the state are protesting the state Department of Social and Health Services’s unilateral decision to cut client hours.

Demonstrations are being held at DSHS offices in half a dozen cities, where many members have  made the courageous decision to participate in acts of civil disobedience.

Pam McCarty, was arrested last night,along with four other SEIU Healthcare 775NW members, for trespassing during a sit-in protest at the DSHS offices in Vancouver, WA.

McCarty has worked as a caregiver for more than 12 years and her client—Israel—relies on her for transportation, cooking, shopping and administering life-saving insulin shots. She says that DSHS’s unilaterally imposed hours cuts will result in unsafe and deteriorated conditions for Israel and thousands of other clients.

The cuts to work hours for in-home care services by DSHS went into effect on February 1 without legislative approval and without prior notice to clients or workers.

Why did you decide to do an act of civil disobedience?

I decided to do an act of civil disobedience because of my commitment to my client. I didn’t want to put limits to my actions. It’s our responsibility to help our clients through our voices and actions. I decided to take the next step. Unfortunately, to wake policy makers up we have to show them how far we were willing to go to protect our clients. And we were willing to go as far as getting arrested and put our own safety and comfort on the line.

Why were you protesting at the DSHS offices?

We chose the office that we did because it is where the DSHS hearings are heard. When these cuts were made, they also took away the right the client to be able to protest those hours cuts. The office we were in would have been the place where we could have appealed those cuts and hours. But they also took that right away from us.

What can you say about DSHS’s unilateral decision to make cuts to hours?

First, these cuts were immoral. Secondly, I think the cuts are illegal. And third, policy makers at DSHS didn’t even take it to the legislature for a discussion. The cuts in hours were taken from the client, but the caregiver still has to perform the same tasks. In order for caregivers to perform those tasks, you have to decide which of the many tasks you have to perform for a client you will do and which ones not to perform. How can you decide between going to the hospital and other essential tasks?

I only get paid for three hours a day. We do a lot of work for free. The ones that suffer are the clients. They take away from the most vulnerable so that corporations and wealthy can avoid having to pay the same percentage of taxes on their income as we pay on our income.

What was being under arrest like?

It was dehumanizing. We were treated just like any other prisoner. We were put into a cell with no windows or furniture. Some of us are in our 50’s, so it was extremely uncomfortable for us. It was kind of scary. But I’d do it again in a heartbeat if it meant that it would help protect my client and other seniors and disabled.

The moment you were in the police car, how did you feel?

I was nervous because I had never been inside a police car before. I had never been inside a jail before.

I was glad that they finally arrested us. If they hadn’t, we wouldn’t have made as much impact to let DSHS know that we were willing to go this far.

Why is it important to act as part of a union to defend workers’ rights?

Without the workers and union support, clients don’t have a voice for themselves. If they get a letter that says, ‘We’re cutting your hours and you cannot appeal this.’ They can’t go out and fight it, they don’t have the financial or physical capacity to fight back. It’s our moral and legal obligation to support people with disabilities and seniors who entrust their lives in our hands to take care of them.

What message would you like to send to your fellow homecare workers and members?

I know that a lot of members support us. Being arrested isn’t for everyone and so I wouldn’t expect everyone to be willing to do what we did. But all of us need to educate the public about why we are organizing and advocating for our clients. We need to change opinions about unions that people have been misinformed about.

The union has given us the right to protect our clients. That’s why we’re caregivers because we love our clients.

I was a caregiver before the union was formed. I was alone trying to protect my client. As a union we are able to get help for our clients to get the care they need. We are able to stand up to policy-makers, as a large group willing to fight for the most vulnerable. I don’t feel like a hero, I just did what needed to be done.

By Paris Achen

Vancouver police and Washington State Patrol officers place protester Pamela McCarty in a police vehicle. Photo by Troy Wayrynen

Columbian Staff  Reporter

Originally published February 21, 2012 at 8:54 p.m., updated February 21, 2012 at 8:39 p.m.

A dozen protesters affiliated with the Service Employees International Union occupied the state Office of Administrative Hearings in Vancouver Tuesday and staged a sit-down strike at closing time Tuesday to protest recent state cuts to in-home care.

Five of the demonstrators chose to be arrested after repeated warnings from police. They were charged with misdemeanor criminal trespassing.

They said they were protesting cuts to work hours for in-home care services paid for by the state Department of Social and Health Services. Effective Feb. 1, the cut of eight hours per month affected Medicaid clients who live 45 minutes away from central services such as grocery stores or receive off-site laundry services from their home care provider. The cut means home care providers lose work hours, which affects their overall income.

“DSHS did this with an emergency rule, which means they didn’t go through the Legislature,” said Benton Strong, a spokesman for SEIU Healthcare. SEIU represents home care workers paid by the state.

“They didn’t tell the Legislature; they didn’t tell the union,” Strong said. “We found out after clients received letters that their hours were being cut.”

DSHS communications director Thomas Shapley did not immediately respond to a call to his cellphone at 7 p.m. Tuesday requesting comment.

The protest began at noon outside the office at 5300 MacArthur Blvd. Some time before closing, the protesters abandoned their outdoor demonstration and moved inside the small lobby of the office. When the office closed, the protesters refused to leave the lobby in defiance of office employee and police officer requests shortly after 5 p.m. The protesters circled a pile of laundry they dumped in the center of the lobby as they sang lyrics they’d made up to go along with songs such as “Happy Birthday to You.”

“Dirty laundry to you, dirty laundry to you, dirty laundry, DSHS, dirty laundry because of you,” they sang in unison. The singing was interchanged with chanting and drumming.

“These hours were cut in secret,” said Sharon Kitchel-Perdue, a home care worker from Olympia who came to

Vancouver for the protest. Kitchel-Perdue said five out of 12 protesters were from Clark County.

About 16 police cars from Washington State Patrol and the Vancouver Police Department responded to the scene. The officers arrested protesters about an hour after their response and after multiple warnings. They escorted each protester out of the lobby one by one to a back door, where police cars were parked.

Vancouver resident Gayle Sevier, 54, was one of those arrested. She is paid by the state to care for her 89-year-old mother, Clara Sevier. Her state-paid hours have been reduced from 108 hours per month in 2011 to 100 hours in February because Gayle Sevier washes Clara Sevier’s laundry at a laundry business away from the 89-year-old’s home at Vintage Vancouver, an independent-living retirement center. Gayle Sevier lives at the center with her mother. She said she has had to reduce her grocery budget since her hours were cut. Her mother’s meals are included in the retirement center rent.

In Washington, the median pay for a state-employed home care worker is about $10.40 per hour, said Linda Lee, a Vancouver caretaker on the board of the SEIU local chapter.

Those arrested were to be booked into jail and expected to be released,

said Vancouver police Sgt. Kevin Hatley.

Amping up their campaign to pressure the Department of Social and Health Services to reverse its unilateral cuts to home care services, SEIU Healthcare 775NW members and homecare clients staged a sit-in demonstration at the DSHS Vancouver office.

The protest was one of half a dozen being staged at DSHS offices around the state.

Chants of “Dirty laundry, DSHS, dirty laundry because of you,” dumping clients’ laundry in the lobby and members refusing to leave the office, brought police and six arrests for trespassing.

Read The Columbian’s news article.

The Department of Social and Health Services unilaterally imposed cuts to hours, which members say result in unsafe and unhealthy conditions for clients and are unfair for homecare service providers. The cuts went into effect on February 1 without legislative approval and without prior notice to clients or workers.

Among those participating was Clara Sevier, 89, who watched her daughter and homecare provider be escorted to a police car. Sevier lost eight-hours of care due to the unilateral action by DSHS.

Prior to the arrest, protestors were locked in the lobby of the DSHS offices and news reporters were kept out.

“These hours were cut in secret and DSHS is refusing any appeal,” said Sharon Kitchel-Perdue, a home care worker from Olympia who came to Vancouver for the protest. “We cannot stand by while this agency continues to make cuts to the care we provide to our state’s most vulnerable citizens.”

Steven Lerner at SEIU Healthcare 775NW Convention

More than 80 SEIU Healthcare 775NW members were joined by 40 managers, telling legislators that adding to three consecutive years of cuts to agency funding is not the answer. Click here to send an email to your legislators; let them know that you oppose additional cuts to agency rates and support raising revenue to prevent cuts.

The governor’s proposed $1 per hour cut in agency funding, would put into effect a 35 percent reduction to direct-care costs such as staff to recruit, supervise and manage the workforce, and oversight of client care.

“I talked to all three legislators from my district,” said Deborah Moore, an agency provider at the Korean Women’s Association. “I made sure they know that a lot people are going to go without care if these cuts go through.”

“We didn’t just deliver a ‘no cuts’ message, we gave legislators solutions,”  said Darryl Johnson, a home care aide at ResCare in Kent.

Agency caregivers and managers presented a range of alternatives to the governor’s proposed cut, including:

• Refinance home care through the Community First Choice Act in order to bring in additional federal dollars;
• Establish a more precise timekeeping system for Individual Providers; and
• Establish a public utility tax on home care agencies in order to bring in federal money through a similar mechanism as the nursing home and hospital safety net assessments.

“We were very direct with legislators,” said Valerie Anderson-Webb, a home care aide at Addus in Spokane. “We asked them if they would stand with us and oppose the governor’s cuts; we asked if we could count on them to raise revenue to prevent cuts; and we asked them to talk to other legislators about how more cuts will eliminate agency care in many areas of the state.”

Again, you can make a difference even if you couldn’t be in Olympia with our agency caregiver members.  Click here to send a sample email to your legislators; tell them that you oppose additional cuts to agency rates and support raising revenue to prevent cuts.

With a surge in the state’s senior population, it makes no sense to continue eroding support for Washington’s home-care workforce, says the president of SEIU Healthcare 775NW.

By David Rolf, Special to The Times

Then on Friday, we were told that legislators are likely to vote—this weekend—on health insurance exchange legislation that is designed to give all long-term care workers more control, quality choices and better protections when buying insurance.

At the capitol, SEIU Healthcare 775NW members from across the state let legislators know that cuts to both state and federal funding for their programs have left thousands of nursing home workers living in poverty and left our vulnerable seniors with inadequate care and insufficient staffing.

“We didn’t just tell legislators that the cuts must end, we offered solutions,” said Alicia Fletty, a new member from Vancouver, who along with other members talked with more than 30 Senator and Representatives as they came out of their respective sessions.

Members stressed three issues with legislators:

• Increasing the nursing home safety net assessment to the maximum in order to gain an additional $15 million in federal funds for nursing homes.
• Reform the nursing home payment system to ensure wealthy residents and nursing homes don’t receive higher rates that lower income elderly and disabled residents.
• Adequately fund our long-term care ombudsman program, so low-income nursing home residents have someone to advocate for them.

“I’m proud that so many nursing home workers came to Olympia to fight for quality long-term care,” said Donna Peake, who works at Pacific Specialty & Rehab Care in Vancouver.  “Our hard work to build strength in the workplace paid off today. We stood together and made our voices heard.”

Tuesday, January 24^th, more than 200 home care workers belonging to SEIU Healthcare 775NW, a labor union that represents 43,000 long term care workers, converged on the capitol to demand that state legislators stop cuts to long term care services for seniors and people with disabilities.  Sylvia Liang, a home care worker, community member, and executive board member of the union, led nearly a dozen fellow Cantonese-speaking members to talk to their legislators, particularly about a cut to home care agencies that agencies say would force them to close their doors.  Asian Pacific Islanders overwhelmingly choose in-home care services to care for elders and people with disabilities in our community over other settings such as nursing homes. Cuts to agencies like ResCare, Korean Women’s Association, and Catholic Community Services could affect thousands of APIs as clients would lose home care services and workers would be out of a job.

Workers braved hours in the cold, freezing rain and relentless gusts of wind to get their message across to legislators who will be negotiating the state budget over the next few weeks.  Legislators face a $1.5 billion budget gap.  Caregivers like Liang are demanding that legislators consider revenue options instead of making devastating budget cuts that would both leave their clients out in the cold, and thousands without a job.

Why They Leave:

Turnover Report Executive Summary

Why They Leave Report

Turnover in the long-term care industry is at a crisis point and threatens quality of care and quality of life for vulnerable adults who rely on long-term care services. A 2005 national survey found more than 76 percent of states reported that home care worker recruitment and retention were major policy issues. Even given the economic downturn and rising unemployment rates, the vast majority of states still experience significant difficulty in recruiting and retaining qualified direct care workers. These shortages are likely to worsen over time as demand increases.

This paper, developed with support from Service Employees International Union Healthcare 775NW, provides a broad overview of home care workforce issues in Washington State including findings from a 2011 survey project and interviews designed to further understanding of the needs of Washington’s home care workers and what motivates them to both enter and leave this profession.

But this week, we testified in two hearings in favor of a bill that would make sure Medicaid dollars are going to the people who really need them, not big pharmaceutical and healthcare companies trying to pad their profits by cheating the system.

These two bills, one each in the House and Senate, are designed to curb Medicaid fraud by drug companies that overcharge for medications or healthcare systems that fraudulently bill for services paid for by Medicaid. Instead of cutting services for our most vulnerable, we should be saving millions of dollars by eliminating fraud within the Medicaid system.

The public has demanded greater accountability and transparency, as part of I-1163, by setting up audits of the Long-Term Care program. That accountability should extend to all places where fraud is evident and costing the state money.

Send a letter to your legislator and tell them to fight wasteful fraud in the Medicaid system.

It was a busy week in Olympia, with a wet, but successful Lobby day on Tuesday, the Medicaid fraud bill, and attempts by a few legislators to actually extend a tax loophole indefinitely. See more about lobby day here.

While our state continues to struggle through a massive budget deficit, there are members of the legislature who think corporations deserve more tax breaks. They introduced two bills that would extend loopholes, leaving no accountability, and hand out more tax breaks to corporations. That is the kind of backward thinking that got us into this mess in the first place. We need our wealthy and corporations to pay their fare share, so that our most vulnerable don’t continue to lose services.

We are in a thick of a fight to get caregivers out of poverty, by ensuring wealthy pay their fare share, cleaning up fraud in the Medicaid system, and calling on our elected leaders to raise revenue, instead of slashing more vital services. Pharmaceutical and healthcare companies are trying to protect their profits just like big corporations are trying to keep their tax breaks and loopholes.

We have to stop them from doing it at the expense of the most vulnerable and hard-working caregivers across Washington state.

Send a letter to your legislator today. Tell them to stand with working people and the vulnerable people we serve.