FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
MAY 27, 2005
Disabled People with In-Home Assistance
Media Contact
Sally Hart, Staff
Attorney
Robin Murphy, Managing Attorney
(520)
327-9547
(602) 274-6287
The order
came nearly one year after the Court ordered AHCCCS to implement sweeping
changes in its Home and Community Based Services program. On August 13,
2004, Judge Carroll ordered AHCCCS to make extensive reforms which included:
providing services for each qualified individual without gaps in service;
developing adequate alternative or contingency plans when a service is unable
to be provided; offering a rate of pay to health care workers to attract and
retain workers so that services are adequately delivered; monitoring its entire
program to detect gaps in service and deliver substitute services within four
hours when a worker fails to show up; and implementing a grievance process to
allow members to report gaps in services, and inform each member of their
rights ordered by the U.S. District Court.
“This order
provides far more specific relief with clear time tables for implementation,”
said Sally Hart, Staff Attorney at the
The
modified injunction reduces the number of hours AHCCCS Program Contractors have
to fill gaps in the delivery of critical services from four to two hours.
In addition, the order forces AHCCCS to comply with many of the remedies by
August 15, 2005.
The lawsuit
was filed by the
AHCCCS had
requested a stay and appealed Judge Carroll’s August 13, 2004 decision to the
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. On May 17, 2005, the Ninth
Circuit denied the stay request and oral argument on the appeal could come as
early as October 2005.
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The
Arizona Center for Disability Law is a not for profit public interest law firm,
dedicated to protecting the rights of individuals with a wide range of
physical, mental, psychiatric, sensory and cognitive disabilities. The