No Real Emergeny Prep for Residents This Session, Bill Now Strengthens Inability for Local Jurisdictions to Regulate

Dear Texas Legislature #txlege,

Looks like you are going ahead with this awful amendment.

Legislative session after session, families have begged you for real emergency preparedness regulations in long-term care. And session after session, lobbyists have won.

Texas Caregivers for Compromise is 3000 ordinary Texas NOBODY families with loved ones who either live in long term care facilities now or have lived and died in long term care. We are not lobbyists. We are just families. Constituents with jobs and lives and loved ones who need our attention. We cannot be at the Captiol knocking on doors the way provider reps do. And our pockets are shallow.

We are extremely frustrated and concerned about HB3595. We have waited session after session for real and effective emergency preparedness but the industry always wins. Always. And here we go again with an amendment that renders this bill ineffective on behalf of ALFs and against the interests of residents and prevents local jurisdictions from assisting long-term care residents. 

If the amendment passes, we prefer the bill to fail.

We will try again next session and plead our case county by county.

We must stop working IN FAVOR of facilities' profit over residents and despite what the provider lobbyists say, there is no evidence facilities are closing or will close if they must meet emergency prep guidelines. 

We are not ignorant or unsophisticated for saying otherwise.

Every argument by provider reps is always "facilities will close". If they must maintain a patient care ratio, facilities will close. If they must keep a reasonable number of staff, facilities will close. If they must provide any accountability at all, facilities will close.

This is also NOT just a hurricane bill. Obvously counties like Harris lose power frequently in hurricanes. The rest of the state also loses power due to transformer damage, construction accidents, storms, tornadoes, car accidents, lightning, scheduled maintenance, and many other reasons. It's ROUTINE for facilities to lose power. Ask our 3000 families. I had a themometer on my mother's camera in her room to ALERT me when the temperature was extreme. We are exhausted.

The only representatives our loved ones have besides us are the long-term care ombudsmen and AARP Texas.

Nobody hears us. We can't be at the Capitol full time because we work to pay the facilities and look after our loved ones.

Hear us. The amendment is bad. It makes the whole bill bad. We know.