Seniors Rally For Protection Against Cuts In Health Care And Elder Services

BOSTON/Roxbury - Older residents of Boston and other cities led by advocates from the Mass Senior Action Council demonstrated on Thursday against cuts in funding for state programs such as Prescription Advantage. About forty people gathered at the intersections of Blue Hill and Geneva Avenues and Warren Street in Grove Hall. Shaking pill bottles and wearing plastic buttocks sticking out from underneath hospital gowns several activists chanted “keep me covered” while supporting hospital nurses whose ranks they say have been thinned drastically by budget cuts. The Prescription Advantage program covers drug costs for people 65 and older as well as younger people with disabilities who work forty hours or less and earn slightly more than the federal poverty level. Activists with the statewide Mass Senior Action Council based in Roxbury expressed frustration last year when the program’s 2009 budget was slashed by $7 million dollars; eliminating funding for co-payments and insurance deductibles for many low and moderate income seniors. The cuts they say affected 44 000 of the 65 000 seniors who rely on the prescription program to cover the costs of their medicines. “Prescription Advantage was originally a stand-alone program for seniors that many of the members of Mass Senior Action helped to develop when there was no prescription coverage available ” said Mass Senior Action’s Executive Director Carolyn Villers. For seniors earning up to 188% of the federal poverty level or about $19 000 dollars a year Villers said “those people lost their coverage through the deductible period and also for the first time had to pay Medicare ‘D’ copayments rather than Prescription Advantage copayments. So their out of pocket costs increased roughly a thousand dollars or more.” More recently the 2010 budget signed by Governor Deval Patrick cuts another $10 Million from the program; down to a total of $40 Million. In an ultimately unsuccessful bid to help seniors Cambridge Representative Alice Wolf Chair of the Joint Committee on Elder Affairs along with twenty of her colleagues introduced an amendment to the House Budget that would have restored the prescription funding to its 2008 level of just over $57 Million. According to the State Executive Office of Elder Affairs website “The legislation which funds Prescription Advantage requires the Executive Office of Elder Affairs to operate the program within its appropriation for the current fiscal year; thus during the course of the year the Plan may be required to impose cost containment measures.” During Thursday’s rally in Grove Hall John Bennett statewide President of the Mass Senior Action Council stopped short of saying that elected officials should never cut any program affecting seniors but pointed out that the elderly represent some of the state’s most vulnerable citizens. “What I’m saying is that they are one of the groups that are most affected and least able to take care of themselves. There are a lot of other people who need state help so definitely we need to find a way of raising more money so the state can accomplish what it really wants to do to help people who really need it.” Standing along Blue Hill Avenue and shaking a pill bottle Gloria a resident of Roxbury and a member of the Senior Action Council said “we can’t afford our medicines at times. Things are being cut what do we do? We have to fight for our rights.” Seniors and their allies won’t stop demanding attention until elected officials start listening she added. “We’ll keep trying until we get them to hear our side. We’re the seniors. And people are living to get older now. We need much more help than we’re getting sometimes.” With drivers blasting their horns in solidarity with the demonstration Boston City Councilor and Mayoral candidate Sam Yoon was asked if he supported any new innovations the city could use to raise revenue. Yoon who in April said that financial reforms should include “ways the city works ” said Thursday he now favors eliminating “the antiquated Boston Redevelopment Authority which is a dinosaur of an agency.” “The BRA has locked up billions of dollars of real estate and property in our city which we can’t get to as taxpayers. For us to eliminate that and to realize value from that is the single most significant way that we can bring additional resources into the control of taxpayers for the benefit of residents in our city.” Earlier this year at the state level Governor Patrick appointed Ann L. Hartstein – formerly Executive Director of the advocacy group Massachusetts Association of Older Americans - as the Secretary of Elder Affairs following the January resignation of Mike Festa. Hartstein who began her position on July first has championed the use of overlooked state and federal tax credits such as the "Senior Circuit Breaker Tax Credit” enacted by the state legislature in 1999. Advocates estimate that eligible taxpayers are missing out on $10 Million dollars a year in credits in this program alone. State officials hope money raised by the increase in the state sales tax from 5 to 6.25% will help offset a variety of budget cuts. But more it appears will have to be done with less. According to researchers at the non-profit Mass Budget and Policy Center the 2010 state budget “spends more than a billion dollars less than the budget enacted last July. It also represents a reduction of approximately $2.4 billion below the level that would be required to provide the same level of services as the Fiscal Year 2009 budget funded.” Federal money appropriated through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 slowly is reaching and being spent in Massachusetts. But as federal state and municipal officials look for ways to cover health care costs for as many Americans as possible seniors and other vulnerable citizens face rising costs and an uncertain future. “There are countless stories that I’ve heard…of how budget cuts affect our people” said Carolyn Villers. “One of our members the Vice President for the Boston chapter when she went to the pharmacy in January she was used to paying an $18 co-payment for her diabetes medication. And when she picked up her medication she was asked for $150 for two separate medications which quite honestly she was not able to afford.” Villers says this particular senior was fortunate; her doctor was able to switch her to a less expensive generic medication. Many others Villers pointed out are not as lucky. OMB Audio: Carolyn Villers Mass Senior Action Council Executive Director; Gloria an MSAC member; Boston City Councilor and mayoral candidate Sam Yoon; Muriel Barksdale another MSAC activist; Mass Senior Action Council statewide President John Barnett Web Resources: http://www.masssenioraction.org/templates/System/default.asp?id=40030 http://www.mass.gov/?pageID=eldershomepage&L=1&L0=Home&sid=Eelders Photos by Elizabeth Washburn. All Photos Copyright Elizabeth Washburn 2009. Bookmark/Search this post with: Delicious Digg StumbleUpon Reddit Newsvine Facebook Google Yahoo Technorati