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Priorities of the Senior Tar Heel Legislature
2005 Legislative Priorities
- Increase funding for home and community based services for
older adults by increasing the Home and Community Care Block Grant
by $5 million. Home and community-based services help impaired
older adults stay in their homes. Key services include home-delivered
meals, adult day care/day health care, in-home aide, and respite
care for family caregivers. As the older population continues to
grow, so does the demand for services. Those in particular need of
services are the over 125,000 older adults in the state who are 85
and older and those who are disabled. More than a quarter of the
persons age 65 and older living in the community have two or more
physical or mental conditions that make it difficult for them to
do such activities as walking, dressing, and bathing. Although there
is an increased need for services, the state is losing ground in
its effort to help frail older people in the community. State funding
for home and community based services is almost 2% less now than
it was in FY2000-01. During the last four years, there has been a
decline in the number of persons served and the number of services
provided through the Home and Community Care Block Grant. Numerous
counties in the state are reporting over 200 seniors on waiting list
for key home and community base services.
- Re-enact the long-term care insurance tax credit as recommended
by the N.C. Study Commission on Aging. The General Assembly
passed legislation in 1998 to allow individuals
who purchase a long-term care insurance policy to claim a state income tax
credit. The purpose of the credit was to encourage more people to purchase
long-term care insurance policies which assist with the cost of in-home and
nursing home care. This results in a public benefit of having an increased
number of people paying privately for long-term care services. The credit
was 15% of the premium paid, not to exceed $350 for each qualified long-term
care insurance contract. It was effective for the tax year which began on
January 1, 1999. The legislation had a sunset provision and the credit expired
at the end of the 2003 tax year. Legislation is needed to re-enact the tax
credit which is referenced in G.S. 105-151.28 and G.S. 105-160.3(b)(7).
- Strengthen efforts to protect the quality of our State’s
air, water, and soil and appropriate $10 million in grant funds for
communities to address environmental contamination. As the
population of our State increases and our communities become more
developed, protecting our environment from sedimentation, air emissions,
and other sources of environmental contamination becomes more challenging.
Frail older adults and others with compromised health are among those
most likely to suffer from these hazards. At this time the State
does not have a dedicated source of funding for the clean up and
redevelopment of contaminated sites, and there are no State funds
earmarked for grants to local governments. Limited competitive federal
grants are available to help local governments clean up and redevelop
contamination sites, but this funding can only address a small number
of the sites needing clean up. Experience has shown in North Carolina
that public investment in clean up and redevelopment can bring in
much larger private investment and significant increases in property
value.
- Increase funding for senior centers by $3 million. There
are 160 senior centers in North Carolina currently operational or under
development in 97 counties in the state. These centers provide a variety
of programs and services to enhance the health and wellness of older
adults and to support their efforts to remain independent in their
communities. The current recurring state appropriation for senior centers
is limited to $1,415,316. Many senior centers have had to reduce the
variety of activities and services they offer, reduce operating hours
or days, close satellite locations, reduce outreach to older adults
in remote areas, and delay needed maintenance and repairs to facilities
and equipment because of funding constraints.
- Take steps to better support grandparents and other family
members raising minor kinfolk (children). Statistics from
the 2000 Census show that in North Carolina over 135,000 children
under the age of 18 live in grandparent-headed households. Another
39,000 live in homes headed by relatives other than grandparents.
The growing number of grandparents or other family members raising
minor children is a social phenomenon not limited to any particular
ethnic group, geographic location, or economic circumstances. Substance
abuse, illness, death, divorce, abandonment, child abuse or neglect,
job loss, incarceration and other circumstances contribute to reasons
children are being raised by relatives other than their parents,
either permanently or temporarily. Several current State Statutes
need to be modified to better provide adequate legal authority for “kinship
caregivers” to parent these children including the following:
- G.S. 115C-366(a3) - pertains to assignment of students,
- G.S. 115C-113 - pertains to diagnosis and evaluation and an individualized
education plan,
- G.S. 90-21.1 - pertains to when a physician may treat a child without
consent of parent, guardian or person in loco parentis.
Legislation is also needed to expand subsidies for child care (before and after
school) to include kinship caregivers and to enact a “de facto custodian” law
to allow a court to declare a relative or non-relative caregiver as a child’s
de facto custodian.
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