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Public Policy Information on DSP Wage Increases from Other States
Utah was successful:
From my colleague there –
Attached is the 2015 document we shared with Social Services Appropriations Committee and Executive Appropriations Committee members regarding our three year plan to increase DSP compensation. Since we worked through the appropriations process, direct legislation wasn’t drafted, so I don’t have anything in code to send to you.
I’m also going to share the link to a legislative audit of provider rates confirming the information we provided the committees was correct – http://le.utah.gov/interim/2015/pdf/00001775.pdf
Here are the appropriated amounts by legislative session:
2015 Legislative Session –
- $5,395,200 ongoing for FY2016 for direct care staff salaries (compensation)
- $1,250,000 one-time for the last quarter of FY2015 for direct care staff salaries (compensation)
2016 Legislative Session –
- $5,000,000 ongoing for FY2017 for direct care staff salaries (compensation)
Another critical component to this effort was UACS tracking our member turnover rates. Leading in to the 2015 Legislative Session our average turnover rate was 86%. That had been consistent over several years. We assessed the turnover rates after FY2016, which was the first full year funding for the three year plan. With the increase in compensation turnover dropped to 57% – a 29-point decrease after 5 quarters of funding. The clearly demonstrates that the appropriations have worked as we had hoped and predicted and should be continued through the final third year, which we will lobby for during the 2018 Legislative Session.
infosheet-dsp-appropriations-2-10-15
Illinois was unsuccessful:
From my colleague there:
Here is a link to the legislation that cleared our legislature this year, but was vetoed (we failed to override) by our Governor:
We’ll have another crack at passage during a lame duck session in January (expected outcome is the same).
I expect our coalition will come back together next month to incorporate lessons we’ve learned into revisions to our bill moving forward to our next General Assembly. We’ve received a great deal of constructive feedback from legislators (i.e. – against putting wages/salaries into state law, a ramp up would be more palatable in this environment, parity with other workers with similar responsibilities, etc.)
Also see blog post on DOL Shares Important DSP Workforce Data!
