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| Putting the Senior Tax to Bed |
February 06, 2006 |
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Seniors in nursing homes have been forced to pay $8.82 per day as part of the "bed tax." Heather continues to oppose this state tax on seniors, and now wants to see that money returned to you.
Because of pressure from seniors and leaders like Heather, New Mexico state officials are considering a repeal of the tax. Rep. Wilson also thinks that state legislators should move to return the money seniors paid under this ill-fated tax.
A daughter decries burdensome bed tax
A daughter takes aim at state bed tax that hits the elderly and their families who rely on nursing homes for care.
By Kate Nash, Tribune Reporter
SANTA FE - While she toiled as a tailor in a dry cleaning shop in Washington state, Mary Shockley scrimped and saved.
As a teenager, Shockley`s daughter, Betty Russell, didn`t appreciate her mother`s thriftiness.
"Everything she had served two purposes," she said. "When something was done with one duty, it served another."
These days, Russell is glad her mother socked away as much as she did, now that the 89-year-old Shockley lives at La Vida Llena, an Albuquerque nursing home that costs close to $5,000 a month.
About $273 of that monthly bill is the bed tax the state imposed in 2004.
The tax was levied to help the state cover Medicaid costs, Gov. Bill Richardson`s administration said.
Russell and Republican members of the House are calling on the Legislature this year to repeal the tax, something the governor said he wants as well.
"I`m appalled that our state is so in need of money that it had to tax the fragile elderly and handicapped at the final stages of their lives," Russell said during a news conference Monday at the Capitol.
Members of the GOP also want the state to pay back the $10 million they estimate patients have paid in the past few years. The tax is almost $9 a day.
"Do not just repeal the bed tax. Give it back to them," Russell said.
The Senate has already passed a Democrat-sponsored bill to do away with the tax, one of few bills this session to get the approval of one chamber.
The Republican version, which includes the rebate, was tabled by the House Consumer and Public Affairs Committee.
Richardson spokesman Pahl Shipley said the governor supports that measure.
"The surcharge, which was charged to nursing homes, not patients, helped fill the financial gap created by federal cuts to Medicaid," Shipley said. "And the federal matching funds received were pumped right back into providing health care for New Mexicans."
But House Minority Leader Ted Hobbs, an Albuquerque Republican, called on Richardson to refund the money.
"The governor felt like we could send out rebates for oil and gas. Why can`t he do it for this?"
New Mexicans last year got rebates between $64 and $289 to help offset high oil and natural gas prices.
"If we`ve done it before, we can do it again," Hobbs said.
Russell said she would put her mother`s refund into her health care costs, if the Legislature were to approve it.
"You pull 300 bucks out of your pocket every month and see if it feels like a sacrifice," she said. |
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