Adult Foster Home Bargaining Update: 7/24/09
Friday, July 24th we reached agreement on three items at the AFH Bargaining table, (a record pace for us). With drum roll, please welcome our newly minted agreements:
*Statement of Intent: RN Delegation – establishes a joint committee of stakeholders to identify and resolve the shortage of RN’s needed to delegate providers, particularly in rural areas.
*Statement of Intent: Criminal Background Checks – establishes a joint committee of stakeholders to address portability for providers, resident managers and substitute caregivers. The State has said they “violently agree” with us that criminal background check policy needs an overhaul.
*Letter of Agreement – Training – this is an extension of our current LOA, but with a caveat that DHS will partner with us on potential grant opportunities
The State gave us a counter-proposal on Service Fees – we can continue to attach their service fee schedule to our contract. We weren’t surprised by the State not offering a COLA, but it did seem like a thinly veiled attempt to appear to be bargaining in good faith without really doing so. We have 8 subsections in our Service Fee article, including language that provided retroactive rate increases back to when the resident’s needs increased. Through the mediator we were told that AFH providers ALREADY have the ability to receive a retroactive adjustment on their service fee. That was news to the bargaining team, although one member did say she had received a retroactive increase. We should be testing this capability for retroactive adjustments.
We did not reach agreement on our proposal for timely payments through MMIS for mental health providers. They are saying that checks will only be processed on Fridays. July 4th this year was observed on a Friday, which meant that checks would not be processed until July 10th. We want checks processed within 3 business days of submission. They say MMIS cannot accommodate that feature.
We have several proposals that the state has declared permissive/prohibited. Right now, we are on a track to take this contract through to arbitration. The articles in question are all non-economic, but important in establishing benchmark rights for providers:
Union Representation – providers have Weingarten rights
Provider Rights – whistle-blower protection, right to know when an investigation is initiated and the charges, as well as a timely process, completed investigations prior to posting findings on the WEB and a process to remove material from the WEB, the right to legal representation, pre-arranged appointments for annual inspections.
Under Service Fees – transparency and consistency in setting service fees and providing comprehensive service plan, timely consideration for requests for adjustments in service needs
There is one more mediated session scheduled on August 5th where we will hear a presentation from the State on Mental Health’s plan for a new payment system. We are consulting with our legal staff as well as Michael Tedesco, a well-known labor attorney who specializes in arbitration and has worked with Local 503 on a number of other non-strikeable units in preparation for moving to arbitration.
In the meantime, the surveys designed to elicit real-life examples that support our bargaining proposals should continue to be completed by providers at regional meetings, during visits or through the resource line.