Chief of state's Office of Long Term Care quits, cites issues with boss

The director of the agency responsible for licensing and inspecting Arkansas nursing homes said Wednesday that she resigned over differences with her supervisor, who fired her deputy last week.

Carol Shockley stepped down as director of the state's Office of Long Term Care on Tuesday, saying in a two-sentence email to the state's Medicaid director that her resignation was "effective immediately.

In a phone interview Wednesday, Shockley cited difficulties working under Craig Cloud, who became her supervisor when her office was transferred in 2017 to a new division within the Department of Human Services.

Those differences included Cloud's decision last week to fire the office's deputy director, Frank GoBell, she said.

"I'd worked for almost 20 years with Frank as assistant director, and he did a superlative job," Shockley said.

As for her other differences with Cloud, she said, "I had always had a different type of supervisor.

"I had worked with him for almost a year, and I determined it was time for me to leave."

Cloud, director of the department's Division of Provider Services and Quality Assurance, didn't return a message left on his cellphone Wednesday evening. A phone message left for GoBell also wasn't returned.

Department spokesman Amy Webb declined to comment on GoBell's employment status, citing a five-day period for an employee to file a grievance over a termination or suspension.

Shockley, 69, said she started work for the Office of Long Term Care in 1998 and became director about two years later. According to the state's transparency website, her annual salary was $101,170.

The office, which has about 100 employees, licenses and inspects nursing homes, assisted living facilities, facilities housing the developmentally disabled, and adult day care centers. It also investigates complaints against long-term care facilities and their employees.

Asked if she had concerns about the office's ability to carry out its duties, she said, "We are mandated to use the federal regulations, and we continued doing so as long as I was there. That had not changed."

She added, "You couldn't ask for a better staff of surveyors or managers."

"We have a good group of people and they try their very best, and I think we've been successful in doing what [the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services] and the state of Arkansas needs in a state survey agency," she said.

Formerly housed in the department's Division of Medical Services, the office was moved in October 2017 to the newly created Provider Services and Quality Assurance along with inspectors from three other divisions.

Nurse manager Cecilla Vinson was named acting director of the office after Shockley's resignation, Webb said.

Metro on 01/31/2019

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