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As the deadline for filing taxes draws near, direct-care workers — and employers who want to assist them — can still take advantage of PHI’s new online tax resource center designed to help direct-care workers get the tax credits they are entitled to receive and access free tax preparation assistance sites.

“Many providers participated in this year’s outreach effort by sharing information with their staff about the Earned Income Tax Credits and free tax services, and provider associations distributed information about the resources to their members,” said PHI Senior Workforce Advocate Tameshia Bridges.

“PHI appreciates everyone’s support in getting this information out during tax time. We hope that direct-care workers found the resources on the site helpful and took advantage of the tax credits and free services this tax season,” Bridges said.

PHI’s Earn, Keep, Save MORE website hosts materials — including “paycheck stuffers,” fact sheets, and workplace posters — that long-term care employers are downloading to educate their employees about state and federal Earned Income Tax Credits (EITC). The site also provides easy-to-access information on how to locate Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) sites.

The user-friendly tax resource center is designed for employers and direct-care workers themselves.

Rightfully Earned Tax Credits

“One quarter of families who qualify for the Earned Income Tax Credit do not claim it — either because they don’t know about it or because they do not think that they will be eligible since they don’t owe any taxes,” said Bridges, who has been working to raise awareness about EITC and VITA in Michigan for a few years.

The EITC is a refundable tax credit for low- and moderate-income families and individuals.

Single individuals with incomes of up to $43,352 and married couples whose incomes are up to $48,362 are eligible for a federal earned income tax credit of up to $5,666, depending on family size.

Anyone eligible for a federal EITC automatically qualifies for a state EITC if their state offers it; more than half of the states do. State tax credits range from 3 percent to 40 percent of the federal EITC.

Free Tax Preparation Assistance

VITA sites provide free tax preparation assistance and are staffed by IRS-trained volunteers. They are sponsored by various community-based organizations that often offer workshops on saving and financial planning.

Families with an annual income below $49,000 are eligible for free tax preparation assistance at VITA sites through April 18, the extended deadline.

The average annual income (pdf) of all direct-care workers is $17,000; 41 percent of the workforce relies on public assistance.

More information on EITC eligibility, as well as materials to help employers spread the word about EITC and VITA sites, are available on the Earn, Keep, Save MORE site.

Share Your EITC Experience

PHI is seeking stories from employers who provided information to their staff about the tax credits and VITA sites, and workers who used a free tax site or benefited from the EITC. Please contact Tameshia Bridges to share your EITC experience.

– by Deane Beebe

Several Michigan legislators are proposing to help fill the state’s $1.8 billion budget gap by eliminating the Michigan Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) program.

(UPDATE: On March 23, PHI Michigan Senior Workforce Advocate Tameshia Bridges testified [pdf] in front of the Michigan House’s Tax Policy Committee about the importance of retaining the EITC

The EITC is a refundable tax credit for low- and moderate-income working families and individuals, including those who are employed as direct-care workers. State EITC programs are modeled after — and supplement — the federal EITC program.

A Senate bill (pdf) to repeal Michigan’s 3-year-old EITC program was introduced on February 8. House Republicans are also considering eliminating the state program; Governor Rick Snyder (R) has not yet taken a position on it, reported the Lansing State Journal.

A Critical Support

“In Michigan, the federal and state EITC helps 800,000 working families achieve greater financial security and an estimated 14,000 families from falling into poverty while also stimulating local economies,” said Ross Yednock of the Community Economic Development Association of Michigan (CEDAM).

“The EITC is a critical support to thousands of low- and moderate-income families in Michigan, helping hard working families pay bills, make necessary repairs to homes and cars, and save. The EITC is why more Michigan families can keep, and save, more of their hard-earned dollars,” Yednock said.

Michigan EITC provides a credit of $436 on average, which amounts to a 25 cents per hour raise for Michigan’s direct-care workers.

Despite Recession, State EITCs Have Broad Backing

Twenty-four states have state EITC programs. Anyone eligible for a federal EITC automatically qualifies for a state EITC, if offered. State tax credits range from 3 percent to 40 percent of the federal EITC.

“The recession has reduced state revenues, lessening their ability to finance new EITCs or expand existing credits and, in a few cases, leading to cuts for existing credits,” said LeElaine Comer of the Corporation for Enterprise Development.

For example:

• New Jersey reduced its EITC to 20 percent from 25 percent of the federal credit in 2010;
• Iowa and Virginia cut benefits by setting their credits at a percentage of the pre-2009 federal EITC benefit levels (adjusted for inflation), which means the EITC changes under the Recovery Act do not apply; and
• Washington enacted a credit in 2008 but postponed implementation until tax year 2012.

“However,” Comer added, “as one of the largest and most effective wage support programs for low- and moderate-income families, EITCs continue to receive broad backing from both sides of the aisle, and advocates across the country continue to support and defend state EITC legislation.”

Five states, Iowa, Connecticut, Illinois, Hawaii, and Maine, have introduced bills to enact or increase their state EITC.

Earn, Keep, Save MORE

PHI recently launched Earn, Keep, Save MORE, an online tax resource center with eligibility criteria for EITCs, in an effort to aid long-term care providers in assisting direct-care workers to apply for tax credits that they are entitled to receive.

Michigan’s EITC program is still being offered for the 2010 tax year. Returns need to be filed by April 18.

If you are interested in getting involved in the effort to save Michigan’s EITC, contact Tameshia Bridges, PHI Michigan Senior Workforce Advocate, at tbridges@phinational.org.

– by Deane Beebe

The Michigan Department of Community Health is conducting a federally funded evaluation of its long-term care workforce in an effort to capture critical data about it, and to determine whether the needs of the state’s direct-care workers are being met.

The evaluation is being conducted in tandem with a broader evaluation of publicly funded long-term care in Michigan. Both are being funded by a 2008 State Profile grant from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS).

Importance of Workforce Evaluation

Specifically, the Department of Community Health is trying to create an accurate picture of its long-term care workforce by focusing on:

• Volume: How large is the workforce? What is the breakdown between full-time and part-time workers?
• Stability: Is turnover too high? How can it be lowered?
• Compensation: What does Michigan’s long-term care workforce earn on average? Do they have adequate benefits?

“With these workers providing about 70 to 80 percent of the hands-on long-term care to elders and people with disabilities, Michigan’s efforts to obtain data on this workforce are a great step forward in promoting quality,” said Hollis Turnham, PHI Midwest director.

National State Profile Grants

In 2008, Michigan was one of 10 states to be awarded a State Profile Grant from CMS to study its long-term care system. The resulting overview would allow policymakers and stakeholders to identify opportunities to improve long-term care, both on a state-by-state basis and nationally.

Michigan, however, is the only state to combine this grant with technical assistance from the CMS-funded National Direct Service Workforce Resource Center to conduct an in-depth evaluation of its long-term care workforce.

“The work Michigan is doing on assessment — both of its direct-care workforce and current state data sources on the workforce — is invaluable in helping us understand what it takes to collect this vital data,” said PHI National Policy Director Steve Edelstein. “I hope the Michigan experience will help to encourage other states to undertake similar efforts.”

Michigan’s method for measuring its workforce is based on a set of guidelines put forth in a 2009 report co-written by Edelstein and Dorie Seavey, Ph.D., PHI director of policy research. The report was published by the National Direct Service Workforce Resource Center.

– by Matthew Ozga

Direct-care workers in training

The Michigan Office of Services to the Aging (OSA), Michigan State University-College of Human Medicine, and PHI have partnered to address the training needs of personal care aides (PCAs) who serve clients in MI Choice, the state’s Medicaid home and community-based waiver program.

Michigan’s Building Training…Building Quality (BTBQ) project will build and operate a sustainable “gold standard” training program and provide education to over 1,500 new and working PCAs.

PHCAST Award

The training project is made possible by a three-year, $2.03 million Personal and Home Care Aide State Training Program (PHCAST) demonstration grant awarded to OSA on September 29 by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) through Affordable Care Act funds.

Michigan is one of six states to receive PHCAST funding.

“Currently, there are no mandatory training requirements in Michigan for PCAs,” says OSA Deputy Director Peggy Brey. “This grant provides the opportunity to develop curricula and mobilize the aging and disability networks to increase and improve the skills of the long-term care workforce.”

Project Goals

The BTBQ project’s goals are to:

• Create a core curriculum that is based on competencies needed by newly hired PCAs to serve MI Choice clients.
• Build the state’s capacity to deliver adult learner-centered training for the entire PCA workforce, starting with 400 PCAs serving MI Choice clients during the grant period.
• Train PCA peer mentors to support the PCAs in the first six months of employment.
• Offer additional in-service training to PCAs on dementia, home management skills, and prevention of adult abuse and neglect.

The project will be evaluated by Michigan State’s Clare Luz, Ph.D., a gerontologist with clinical experience, who has worked closely with OSA to evaluate previous statewide training programs related to long-term care.

Rapid and Large Growth of Home Health Jobs

“This project also speaks to the huge number of home health aide jobs that the state projects will be created in Michigan in the coming years,” says PHI Midwest Policy Director Hollis Turnham. “Caregiving jobs in long-term care are growing at rates faster and larger than almost all other employment sectors in the state.”

More information on PCAs and the projected growth of Michigan’s direct-care workforce is available at PHI State Facts: Michigan’s Direct-Care Workforce (pdf).

– by Deane Beebe

PHI received the Health Care Association of Michigan (HCAM) and Michigan Center for Assisted Living’s (MCAL) first Michigan Associate Partner of the Year Award at the organizations’ annual convention and business meeting on September 20.

Purpose of Award

The award was created to “recognize and honor Associate Partners who have a profound impact on the long-term care community,” according to HCAM and MCAL.

PHI has been a member of the HCAM and MCAL Associate Partnership program since its recent inauguration in 2009. The organizations describe Associate Partners as being

• dedicated to the success of the profession;
• proud to support programs and services that advance long-term care; and
• able to offer solutions for a variety of industry-related issues.

“This recognition from the Health Care Association of Michigan (HCAM) and Michigan Center for Assisted Living of PHI’s collaborative training and policy efforts reinforces our commitment to improve the quality of supports and services and direct-care jobs,” said PHI President Steven Dawson. “We salute the commitment of these Michigan provider organizations to excellence and innovation.”

PHI Impact in Michigan

PHI’s Michigan-based work began in the late 1990s with a project to introduce the Visiting Nurse Association of Southeast Michigan to peer mentoring. Since 2001, PHI Michigan’s policy and training and organizational development staff have had a full-time presence in the state.

PHI Michigan was honored for its legislative/regulatory activities and accomplishments including:

• supporting a “boilerplate provision” to address the high costs of health insurance coverage for Medicaid-funded long-term care providers, which was included in both the House and Senate versions of the 2009-2010 fiscal year budget and signed into law by the Governor;
• educating Michigan’s federal legislators about the Institute of Medicine‘s Retooling for an Aging America: Building the Health Care Workforce report recommendations and gaining their support for their inclusion in the federal health care reform law; and
• improving the state’s CNA training curriculum and administration.

PHI Michigan has also led a myriad of training and organization development activities throughout the state, including:

• providing technical assistance for the development of the Healthcare Skills Alliance and its Certified Nurse Aide Registered Apprenticeship Program;
• developing, with partners, the Michigan Alliance of Person-Centered Communities, the state’s first culture change coalition recognized by the Pioneer Network;
• supporting state associations’ and advocates’ education and training programs with workshops, seminars, and articles, including producing two webinars for HCAM’s Quality First Leadership Series; and
• introducing the coaching approach to leadership and communications across the state through various public and co-sponsored programs.

PHI Michigan Team

The PHI Michigan policy and training staff members who accepted the award at the HCAM/MCAL event were MI State Policy Director Hollis Turnham; MI Senior Workforce Advocate Tameshia Bridges; and MI Training and Organization Specialists Cean Eppelheimer and Maureen Sheahan. They have been supported in their Michigan work by governmental consultant Jean Doss.

More information on PHI initiatives in Michigan and State Facts: Michigan’s Direct-Care Workforce (pdf) are available online.

– by Deane Beebe

It is not too early to think about the upcoming tax season and ways that direct-care workers can get a bigger refund and keep more of their money at tax time. Read the full story