Heard: Nevada lawmakers throw vital lifeline to home-care workers, clients

Iwas born with cerebral palsy and have relied on the support of home-care workers since I was a kid. I’m in my 30s now, and have seen hundreds of workers come and go. The pandemic made turnover even worse. Since the beginning of COVID alone, I’ve had more than 30 caregivers.

Why has it been nearly impossible to hold onto personal-care aides? Because for over a decade, the average pay for home-care workers has stagnated at around $11 an hour, and most do not have basic benefits through their employers. That’s why I advocated alongside caregivers and their union to win a historic $16 minimum wage and expansion of funding for the home-care industry in the most recent state budget. These increases will be life-changing for Nevada’s 13,000 home-care workers, and for the seniors and people with disabilities such as me who depend on them.

I could not live without my homecare workers. They help me with all the daily tasks that allow me to stay in my home, including getting me out of bed, dressing, bathing, feeding, grocery shopping, picking up prescriptions and taking me to doctor’s appointments.

But home-care workers mean much more to me than just support for my physiological needs. They empower me to live a full life of creativity and purpose. With their help, I have been able to pursue my passion as an artist. I’m one of the first people with disabilities to use “eye gaze” technology to create digital artworks that have been featured in gallery shows.

While home-care workers have helped me flourish and thrive, I have witnessed them struggle to just survive. Many of Nevada’s personal-care aides, who are 85 percent women and 59 percent people of color, can barely keep a roof over their heads and feed their children. These workers are essential for the well-being of their clients in every community throughout our state, but the undervaluing of their work has driven many to leave the field altogether.

Because funding for home care in our state — which is mostly administered through Medicaid — had remained basically unchanged for two decades, it’s been challenging for even conscientious employers to pay workers a living wage.

Underfunding and poverty wages have created a dangerous workforce shortage, especially in more isolated areas, at a time when Nevada’s population is aging much faster than the rest of the country and needs greater care. There are currently more than 438,000 Nevadans older than 65, and because the vast majority would strongly prefer to live at home, demand for services has been skyrocketing. A report by the nonpartisan Guinn Center warns that our state will need 5,300 additional personal-care aides in the next few years.

This crisis led home-care workers to start organizing their union a few years ago, building a coalition with clients and advocates. Through our powerful, persistent advocacy, we were finally able to achieve the fundamental change we desperately need.

In the recent legislative session, the state government passed a bill that established the $16 minimum wage for home-care workers and increased the Medicaid funding rate by 42 percent. These increases will lift up so many workers, whether they spent a lifetime in the homecare field or recently had to take on caregiving duties for a loved one.

Each time I lost a caregiver, I also lost a little more hope that the broken home-care system could ever be fixed. With these major legislative accomplishments, I’m now optimistic that we can continue to transform home-care jobs into sustainable careers so our state’s seniors and people with disabilities can receive quality care.