A Message to Elected Officials of the Connecticut Legislature

[David V. Hunter]

The Mary Wade, is a nonprofit senior care community located in New Haven.  We were founded, and continue serving the community, in our same location 150 years ago, and have developed into a full continuum of senior care services, that includes a Skilled Nursing Center, Residential Care Home, Adult Day Center, Home Care, Community Navigator, Outpatient Rehabilitation Center, Primary Care and a transportation program, serving the senior population and their families in the Greater New Haven Region.

We are writing you today in anticipation of potential federal legislation that will fundamentally change the structure of the Medicaid program.  We are fearful of these changes and are opposing them at the federal level because we fear that changing Medicaid to a block grant or per capita cap would have a substantial negative affect on access to quality medical care and long-term services and supports for older adults and other vulnerable populations here in Connecticut.

Medicaid is the most important financial resource available for families who need help covering the cost of long-term services and supports, whether in their homes and communities or in nursing homes. Medicaid has become the default payer for long-term services and supports because there are no significant alternative sources of payment, other than out-of-pocket.  Eighty percent (80%) of our residents and clients rely on the Medicaid program to pay for their care and services both in the nursing home and through our system of home and community based services.

While we are extremely fearful of the potential change to the structure of the program and strongly oppose the block grant concept, our mission at Mary Wade is to provide high quality medical care, social programs, and residential services to those in need and we are committed to doing so.

Therefore we are reaching out to you today to ask you to consider us a partner and a resource to you should we be faced with the need to redesign our current Medicaid program.

We want to work together with our state legislators, state agencies, and our community partners to ensure that the elderly living in our community can continue to count on the Medicaid program to support the care, services and supports that they so desperately need.

I welcome you to join me at the Mary Wade campus, for a conversation regarding these potential changes.   I can be reached at my direct line at 203.672.7810 or by email message at [e-mail]. 

David V. Hunter, President & CEO 

February 1, 2017