The state Department of Human Services would get $10 million in surplus funds for capital improvement at the state’s five institutions for the developmentally disabled under a proposal that cleared a legislative panel Thursday.
In a voice vote with no one dissenting, the Joint Budget Committee’s Special Language Subcommittee voted to add the extra funds to Senate Bill 112 - an appropriation bill for the department’s Division of Developmental Disabilities Services that oversees the human development centers.
Sen. Jason Rapert, R-Bigelow, proposed the change. The additional money will come from the state’s unobligated surplus funds, which total about $126 million, said Brandon Sharp, the state’s budget administrator.
Rapert told lawmakers that there is a bipartisan contingent, including Sen. Bruce Maloch, D-Magnolia, and Garry Stubblefield, R-Branch, that “would like to see something done” to provide surplus state funding for construction or repairs at the state’s human development centers.
The state has human development centers in Arkadelphia, Booneville, Conway, Jonesboro and Warren. They provide residents with medical care, therapy and other services.
“The fact is, in Booneville’s case alone, there wasan estimate two years ago that they needed $6 million of renovations, and we have reports on the ground there that the situation is really out of control,” Rapert said.
“Some people feel like they need a new facility there if they are continuing to have service there, and there has been no support that I am aware of to actually close that facility down,” Rapert said.
A plan developed in 2011 for the Booneville center - which was originally built in 1909 as a tuberculosis sanitarium - calls for renovating one building and demolishing 19 others and replacing them with new ones at a cost of almost $20 million.
Rapert said his amendment gives the department “enough that if they need to do improvements at Arkadelphia, southeast Arkansas, Conway,Jonesboro, anywhere, they could do it.”
“I believe that these people that are being served in human development centers are the least among us, and we need to make sure that we are taking care of those facilities by [providing] an adequate situation for them to be cared for,” he said.
He said there are some people who need to have “an institutional situation, so I believe we just need to do the best that we possibly can.”
The population of the state’s human-development centers has dropped from about 1,100 in 2003 to fewer than 950, said Charlie Green, director of the Division of Developmental Disabilities Services.
At the same time, the number of people with such disabilities receiving Medicaid-funded services while living in a community-based setting, such as a private home or a group home, has increased from 2,500 to 4,100.
Enhanced Medicaid funding, made available under the federal health-care overhaul law, is expected to increase the number of people receiving community-based services even more, allowing the state to serve 2,600 people who are now on a waiting list.
Under Rapert’s amendment, the department could only use the $10 million for construction, improvements, equipment, renovation and maintenance expenses for its human development centers, Rapert said. The department wouldn’t be allowed to spend this money for operating expenses, he said.
The department would be required to have the Legislative Council or the Joint Budget Committee review in advance any proposed uses of the money “to make sure it is done according to plan,” he said.
Rapert said Democratic Gov. Mike Beebe “had no problem with us proceeding” with the additional funding.
Arkansas, Pages 9 on 02/21/2014