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| From the contract lobbyist – please read carefully! -----Original Message----- Budget Alert - June 27, 2006 The House and Senate budget negotiators continued their work on Sunday and Monday. Work resumes this morning as the plan is to have a final budget by noon today as the clock continues ticking down to the magic hour. It remains to be seen if the House and Senate will be able to negotiate the last few sticking points in the budget by noon today. Last year's budget put things in place for FY 2006-2007 so there is no real pressure to finish things up by June 30. Legislators will not have to pass a continuing resolution to keep state government operating should negotiations extend beyond June 30. Here is an update of items of interest: Quality Improvement Late last week, conferees agreed to support $145,000 for the Quality Improvement contract as specified in the funding line for the LTC Ombudsman Program. Rep. Earle has been generous in helping to negotiate this funding for QI. Please call and thank her for supporting QI. Let's hope the Big Chairs concur with this recommendation. Child Care Subsidy $14,096,395 HHS Conferees approved a plan that provides funding to maintain existing caseload and remove 1,480 children from the waiting list. They have also agreed to implement 20% of the 2005 market rates for 3 to 5 star facilities in Region 1; 35% implementation in Regions 2, 3, 4, 5; and 20% implementation for family child care homes in all counties. This market rate option has a price tag of $6.4 million. I will try to find out if the Big Chairs have okay'd this recommendation. TANF and Maintenance of Effort Provision Cut! On Friday, the HHS conferees agreed to remove the House recommendation that requires counties to use county funding to replace any lost TANF and Maintenance of Effort funds resulting from North Carolina being penalized for not meeting work participation rates. According to Sherry Bradsher, Director of the State Division of Social Services, this could have had a potential budget impact of $2.9 million to more than $14.6 million for counties. MEDICAID RELIEF FOR COUNTIES Child Welfare Collaborative is dropped from TANF The Senate recommended $0 and the House recommended $1m from the TANF Block Grant. This item was discussed on Friday by the HHS conferees. According to Sherry Bradsher, this item must have state funding as well as federal funding (through TANF in this case). Since the HHS conferees were not allowed to fund any new items with state dollars, it looks like the Child Welfare Collaborative will not receive funding this year. CHILD CARE FUNDS MATCHING REQUIREMENT STILL IN BUDGET Conferees tentatively agreed to accept the House recommendation that deals with Child Care Funds Matching Requirement. SECTION 10.36. Section 10.60 of S.L. 2005-276 reads as rewritten: " SECTION 10.60. No local matching funds may be required by the Department of Health and Human Services as a condition of any locality's receiving any State its initial allocation of child care funds appropriated by this act unless federal law requires a match. This shall not prohibit any locality from spending local funds for child care services. If the Department reallocates additional funds above twenty-five thousand dollars ($25,000) to local purchasing agencies beyond their initial allocation, local purchasing agencies must provide a twenty-five percent (25%) local match to receive the reallocated funds. Matching requirements shall not apply when funds are allocated because of a disaster as defined in G.S. 166A-4(1). " Call Big Chairs today! ASK LEGISLATORS TO REMOVE THIS PROVISION! Legislators need to hear from you today! Let's take action on these items now! PLEASE CONTACT YOUR LEGISLATORS NOW! Representatives Insko - Orange Farmer-Butterfield - Wilson B. Allen - Wake England – Cleveland Barnhart – Cabarrus Bordsen – Alamance Weiss - Wake House Big Chairs
Vice Chair Rep. Michaux Senators Purcell - Scotland Malone – Wake Nesbitt - Buncombe D. Berger – Franklin Senate Big Chairs
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