ATLANTA – A New York-based long-term care advocacy group is criticizing Gov. Brian Kemp’s decision to remove a pay raise for direct care workers serving Georgians with intellectual and developmental disabilities from the fiscal 2024 state budget.
A federally funded study the state Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities conducted recommended a wage increase of $6 an hour for direct care workers, the group Caring Across Generations reported this week in a news release. The General Assembly approved the proposal and added it to next year’s budget, pending approval from the federal Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.
But Kemp removed that line item from the budget last Friday, arguing the legislature failed to provide the estimated $105 million that would be required to pay for the raises.
“[That] would require the department to redirect 25% of existing program funding for other services to meet the additional cost,” the governor wrote in his message removing the item. “This unfunded mandate would have devastating impacts on the department’s ability to maintain existing levels of service to the adult developmentally disabled community.”
Vanessa Faraj, senior campaigns manager in Georgia for Caring Across Generations, said forcing direct care workers to go without the proposed pay raise will only worsen a workforce shortage.
“It’s disappointing the recommendation to increase pay from $10.63 to $16.70 per hour was disregarded because Georgia’s direct care worker shortage, caused by the lack of family-sustaining wages and benefits, harms everyone in the state — especially disabled people and older adults seeking to live and age in own homes and communities and family caregivers taking time out of the paid workforce to support the health and well-being of their family members,” Faraj said.
In his message, Kemp instructed the department not to provide the raises until the funds to pay for them have been appropriated.