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Helping hands GOV. Linda Lingle last week turned the Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism on its ear. She wants to strip DBEDT of planning, land-use and housing functions and refocus it on supporting and expanding business and economic activity in the state. Brilliant!
Hawaii's nonprofits need help from the
Legislature to make it easier to compete
with other states for federal fundsBy John Flanagan
Special to the Star-BulletinA similar opportunity for clear thinking and "picking the low-hanging fruit" exists in the realm of health and social services.
Lingle's education platform included going after federal education money that the Department of Education didn't have time, staff or matching funds to apply for. Local nonprofits now urge her to create a state office for resource maximization to turn on the federal money taps for health and social services, too.
For example, the feds have offered $67 million to states to fund programs to mentor children of incarcerated parents. The hitch is states must come up with matching funds. Increasingly, private foundations also have tied matching-fund strings to grants. The result is federal and private money that could come to Hawaii doesn't.
Lack of matching funds isn't the only kink in the federal money hose. For instance, Hawaii is one of only two states that don't license professional counselors with master's degrees. Accordingly, says Judith Clark of the Hawaii Youth Services Network, federal youth counseling dollars restricted to licensed professionals never get to Hawaii.
Last year, the Legislature passed a state-licensing bill, but Gov. Ben Cayetano vetoed it. The unintended consequence: When a local agency does successfully land a federally funded counseling contract, it often can't find licensed professionals to fill the jobs.
Speaking of unintended consequences, the Felix consent decree had more than one. The Department of Education's court-mandated, special-education hiring binge created a staff shortages at many agencies that work with those mentally and physically disabled clients who don't happen to be in school.
Garrett Toguchi of The Arc, an agency providing services for people with mental retardation and developmental disabilities, says government created a competition for qualified workers that private agencies, such as his own, Ka Lima O'Maui and Goodwill Industries of Hawaii, are losing.
The result is these service providers, who are funded by state contracts, are looking to boost rates they charge the state to raise staff salaries so they can stay in the game.
The state's recently revised payment system makes it even harder for small private nonprofits to stay in business today. Checks for services rendered under state contracts have been delayed for up to three months creating a crisis for small operations without enough working capital to stay afloat while the check is in the mail.
GAP GROUPS are again an issue this year -- and by "gap" we're not talking blue jeans and sweatshirts. For example, each year in Hawaii about 100 foster- care kids, 16- to 20-year olds -- too old to qualify for foster homes, too young to fend for themselves -- are sent out on their own.
About 20 of these gap groupies will become homeless, says Clark. Hawaii Youth Services Network wants the Legislature to find $200,000 to house these homeless before they become a bigger, more expensive problem.
Then there's the uninsured gap group, folks who don't have health insurance. QUEST, the state program for low-income uninsured has an enrollment cap -- only 125,000 Hawaii citizens at a time can get QUEST coverage.
Today, enrollment exceeds 125,000 and only children and pregnant women can get new coverage. The rest go to the emergency room. We need to raise the cap, says Beth Giesting of the Hawaii Primary Care Association.
QUEST doesn't cover dental benefits for adults, which is a real problem. Hawaii children have the worst oral health in the nation, says Giesting. One reason is lack of access to dental care. Another is that Hawaii, bowing to pressure from well-meaning extremists, still has not fluoridated its water system.
Talk about low-hanging fruit.
THE LEGISLATURE also will hear about parity and equity this year, particularly in the areas of mental health, seniors and prisons.
Advocates seeking parity between mental and physical health programs are pushing for psychiatric advance directives -- living wills for psychiatric care -- that would allow people to select mental-health treatment options in advance. We don't plan to become mentally ill, but it happens.
John McDermott, the state ombudsman in the Executive Office on Aging, is looking for parity, too. If we require criminal background checks for child-care employees, he asks, why not for people who want to work in care homes for the elderly, where there are many cases of criminal abuse, neglect and unnecessary deaths? He wants Hawaii to join the 36 other states that do.
McDermott says Hawaii is the only state where care-home inspectors call ahead to schedule visits. He's pushing for unannounced annual inspections.
Although men in prison in Hawaii don't get enough drug abuse treatment, women in our jails get even less, says Claire Woods of the Substance Abuse Coalition who maintains that there's gender bias in our prison system, not just at exclusive golf courses in Georgia.
Equity demands we treat men and women the same, but both men and women need better programs. Perhaps there's a federal grant?
If we had a state office for resource maximization, we'd know.
John Flanagan, former editor and publisher of the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, is executive director of Hawaii Community Services Council, which works with public, private and nonprofit organizations to improve systems for planning, delivering and managing community resources.