“SEATTLE — Caregivers are calling on Washingtonians who cheered on health care workers when the pandemic began to oppose state cuts to care services.
The Service Employees International Union Local 775’s ‘You Clapped. Now Act!’ campaign is calling on lawmakers to rethink the proposed $1.1 billion cut to the Department of Social and Health Services for the 2021 to 2023 budget.
Olga Garcia is an in-home caregiver in Sedro-Woolley, a city in northern Washington. She said she’s helping her client stay in her home.
‘There’s no way that she would be able to do anything on her own, and she’s scared,’ Garcia said. ‘She doesn’t want to go to a nursing home or somewhere else. She likes where she lives and she likes to have us go in there and care for her.’
SEIU 775 says the cuts put 10,000 in-home caregivers’ jobs at risk, and another 10,000 older people and people with disabilities could be kicked off home-care services. It also could mean 2,800 people will be kicked out of the nursing homes where they live.”
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