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The legislature has tied up two loose ends in the budget for fiscal year 2005 (which began July 1, 2004) that were of great concern to Massachusetts elders and their advocates. They repealed the misguided expanded estate recovery provisions which were passed in 2003, and approved a supplemental budget which includes additional funding to help protect elders from abuse and neglect.
Until last year, Medicaid could only recover its MassHealth expenses for deceased nursing home residents from their probate estates. In August 2003, a new law went into effect expanding MassHealth estate recovery to include non-probate property, thereby allowing Medicaid to place a lien on the primary home of a deceased nursing home resident to recover Medicaid costs even if the home was jointly owned by the surviving spouse of the deceased. The new law expanded the definition of “estate” to mean any legal title or interest in real or personal property and other assets that an individual had immediately prior to death, including an interest in property which would ordinarily pass to a surviving spouse through joint tenancy, tenancy by the entirety, life estate, living trust, or right of survivorship - a change that would negatively effect thousands of Massachusetts elders. Proponents of the law, which appeared to have gotten lost amid the 700 other outside sections attached to last year’s budget, said it would allow the state to recoup approximately $10 million a year in Medicaid expenses. Its passage caused a public outcry from elders and their advocates, who said it was bad policy to take homes away from elders. Upon realizing the harsh implications of the newly expanded estate recovery law, the legislature voted to postpone implementation until the end of fiscal year 2004, and then to repeal the expanded estate recovery provisions as part of its fiscal year 2005 budget. When the governor chose to veto the legislature’s repeal of the provisions this past July, the legislature voted nearly unanimously to override the veto so that the guidelines for estate recovery would be as they were prior to the passage of the expanded estate recovery law in 2003.
According to Mass Home Care, almost 10,000 allegations of elder abuse or neglect were reported this past year to the 24 agencies in Massachusetts, including Elder Services, which form the first line of defense against elder abuse. (In 1984 there were 1,500 reports by 2000, the number of reports per year had risen to 9,000.) As the elder population continues to grow - in Berkshire County the number of elders age 75 or older grew by 16.5% from 1990 to 2000 - elder abuse cases will continue to increase. A greater public awareness of the Protective Services programs here at Elder Services and throughout the Commonwealth has also increased the number of reports received. Unfortunately, these rising reports of abuse have been coupled with a decline in state funding, which has led to serious shortfalls in staff positions to investigate and resolve reports of elder abuse. This past year, approximately 838 elder abuse reports in Massachusetts could not be adequately investigated due to reduced staffing caused by a shortage of funding. In September, the governor and the legislature approved an additional $1.375 million as part of the state’s supplemental budget to help protect elders against abuse and neglect, increasing total funding for the statewide Protective Services programs from $10.1 million to $11.475 million. This additional funding, together with the repeal of the expanded estate recovery provisions, will help many elders to live more safely and securely in their own homes.