CAADS 2024-2025 "Raise Our Rates" Campaign (Updated 03-19-2024)

Thank you to our AB 2428 Supporters who provided their logos!

March 19, 2024

AB 2428 (Calderon) Set for Hearing April 9, 2024, in Health Committee Letters due 4/3

AB 2428 (L. Calderon), to establish in law a minimum Medi-Cal rate floor tied to the published CBAS rate, will have its first hearing on April 9 in the Assembly Health Committee. CAADS sponsored this bill to establish in the law the policy that the Medi-Cal Published rate for CBAS is the lowest rate any Managed Care Plan can pay. It sets this rate as the floor, not the ceiling.

Why is This Important?

Four managed care plans failed to restore the CBAS rate in 2019 when the Legislature removed the 10% rate cut that was put in place during the Great Recession. The managed care plans were given the restored funds at their actuarially set rate but did not pass it along to the CBAS providers. AB 2428 will prevent MPCs from paying below the published rate in the future.

How to Voice Your Support – deadline for letters is April 3, 2024

There is no remote option for testimony this year. Kay Lee, CAADS President, and Lydia Missaelides, Interim Executive Director will testify as the author’s two designated witnesses.

Use this Google link or see below for instructions on how to submit a letter of support to the committee and a template letter that you can personalize with your own message.

You must use the Assembly advocacy portal. It is the only way to submit individual letters to ensure they get to the Committee.

April 3, 2024, is the deadline for letters to ensure your center’s support will be recorded on the publicly available committee analysis.

AB 2428 Group Letter - Submitted by CAADS on April 1, 2024
 

February 21, 2024

Campaign Update: CAADS Sponsors AB 2428 to Establish a Medi-Cal Rate Floor

You will recall that Assemblymember Calderon fought to win the $61.4 million in grant funds in the 2022-23 state budget for Bridge to Recovery for Adult Day Programs and Adult Day Health Care, though, unfortunately, her companion legislation sponsored by CAADS to detail how the grants were to be used, did not make it to the finish line.

AB 2428 is but one of the key pieces of CAADS’ Raise Our Rates Campaign that seeks to secure a fair and equitable Medi-Cal rate for CBAS programs to improve access to needed high-quality services.

A rate floor guarantee is vitally important to avoid exactly what happened during the last huge state budget deficit when provider rates were slashed by 10% across the board. The cut was quickly enacted by a majority of MCPs, but when CAADS accomplished having the provider rate cuts removed in 2019, not all the Medi-Cal Managed Care Plans moved as quickly to restore the CBAS rates.

It has taken CAADS four years and countless hundreds of hours working with DHCS and the MCPs to get all the plans to comply. The current language in the 1115 waiver governing CBAS includes a contracted rate loophole we need to close through the passage of AB 2428.

CAADS asserts AB 2428 is cost-neutral because DHCS has verified that the funds to restore the rates to the full published rate of $76.27 were included in the MCP capitation rate for the 2019-20 budget year.

There is growing concern regarding the state budget deficit as it continues to rise. It is projected that by May, the deficit could reach a point where significant cuts to health and human services budgets may be made. This could potentially set us back and undo the progress we have made about rates and grants.

CAADS is organizing grassroots advocacy to support AB 2428, protect Bridge to Recovery Funds, and preserve rates from cuts, even as we make the case for rate increases.

(If you are a member who is not receiving our weekly, Monday, Members Only - CAADS Connect newsletter sign up here.)

CAADS is rallying for your assistance in support of the RAISE OUR RATES Initiative to push for a Medi-Cal rate hike in the 2024-25 state budget.

The “Raise Our Rates” Advocacy Campaign was publicly announced during our 2023 Fall Conference, Nov. 13-15, 2023, with a video from our CAADS Lobbyist Kristina Bas Hamilton (as shown below) and a video from Assemblymember Cottie Petri-Norris (as shown below), who represents Costa Mesa and surrounding Orange County cities, both delivering inspirational messages of support.

On November 21, 2023, CAADS Interim Executive Director Lydia Missaelides and Kristina Bas Hamilton, CAADS lobbyist met with Senator Menjivar and her Sacramento Health Consultant Kimberly Fuentes to discuss the CAADS “Raise Our Rates” budget and ask and answer questions. As chair of the Budget Subcommittee that hears our issues, Senator Mejivar holds a critical leadership position.

All legislators will be making decisions over the next few weeks about issues they want to champion so it is crucial for centers to reach out to state Senators and Assemblymembers to educate, educate, and then educate some more. Watch our "Raise Our CBAS Rates" CAADS webinar recorded on November 30, 2023, to learn more about what you can do to put grassroots advocacy into action.

Legislative Contacts & District Center Lists

Grassroots Documents