DENVER — Despite challenges from the COVID-19 pandemic, extreme weather and “cheap shots,” the long-term care sector is “still standing,” LeadingAge Board Chairman Mike King said during Monday’s opening session of the LeadingAge Annual Meeting + Expo.
“We have been through absolutely everything,” he said. “We’re still standing because we must keep standing.”
King, who is president and CEO of Volunteers of America, said the sector’s services will transition and evolve, but older adults always will “need care by caregivers who care.”
“Right now, frankly, we need reinforcements,” he said.
To help beef up the workforce pipeline, King said, LeadingAge is focusing its efforts on several proposed bills, including:
- The Citizenship for Essential Workers Act, which would establish a pathway to citizenship and permanent residency for immigrants who were essential workers during the pandemic, including those who worked in home- and community-based services through positions in residential care, direct care and home health care.
- The H-2B temporary guest workers program, which would allow US employers to bring foreign workers in to perform non-agricultural labor services in jobs such as certified nursing assistant and home care aide.
- The Essential Workers for Economic Advancement Act, which would create an H-2C visa classification for temporary non-agricultural workers to fill jobs open for an extended time period. Initially, the visa would be open to 65,000 positions.
- The Healthcare Workforce Resilience Act, which would speed up the volume at which foreign nurses and physicians come into the US by recapturing unused immigrant visas made available between 1992 and 2020.
“We’re not asking for large immigration reform,” LeadingAge President and CEO Katie Smith Sloan said Monday in a meeting with the editors of McKnight’s Senior Living and its sister media brands. “We’re talking about expanding existing channels.”
Sloan and King said they do not expect that changes will occur this year, but they said there is a “running start” for next year with the new Congress just by the fact that the bills already have been introduced.
“If we don’t continue to increase that supply, we’re really stuck,” Sloan said. “It’s a math problem with not enough people.”
The legislative efforts support LeadingAge’s Aging Services Workforce Now! campaign launched over the summer, the leaders said. The advocacy campaign called on Congress to alleviate the aging service workforce crisis through a living wage, incentives to retain and attract staff, expand training and advancement opportunities and enact equitable long0term care financing.
In addition to action from Congress, LeadingAge is “trying to push the boulder” through administrative changes and executive orders, Sloan said. The visa process is stuck with four years of inertia and a lack of instractured to process applications, Sloan said.
Building vaccine access, equity
In other news on Monday, LeadingAge announced a second round of grant funding for programs aimed at increasing COVID-19 and influenza vaccine equity and access among older adults.
The association will distribute $80,000 in funding through a partnership with Community Catalyst and the Vaccine Equity and Access Program, an initiative funded by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Friends House Retirement Community in Sandy Spring, MD; Westminster Communities of Florida in Orlando, FL; and Lutheran Towers in Atlanta each will receive $20,000 in grants to implement vaccination clinics and fund awareness efforts in their communities.
Another $20,000 in grants will be doled out to locally based members for similar efforts. LeadingAge said it also will create and distribute a vaccine equity and access toolkit to members.
“Supporting members and their local partnerships helps to ensure that more people — especially vulnerable populations and care professionals — learn more and receive vaccines and boosters,” Sloan said in a statement.
In its first phase of the partnership, LeadingAge distributed 42 grants in November for vaccination and booster clinics.
2022 Award of Honor
Also at the conference on Monday, James Bernardo, retiring as president and CEO of Presbyterian Senior Living at the end of the year, was celebrated as the recipient of the 2022 LeadingAge Award of Honor.
More than 5,000 people are attending the conference, according to LeadingAge. The meeting continues through Wednesday.
