Tuesday, May 24 2011 3:52PM
A number of adult care centers in California could be shut down if they lose funding as expected.
Should California legislators officially approve budget cuts to rural adult day care centers, which help frail, elderly and disabled patients throughout the state, nearly 37,000 residents would lose services provided by those centers, according to the Associated Press (AP).
The AP says five of California's 309 adult day care centers have shut down operations in the last year, and many more could soon follow if lawmakers strip the facilities of funding.
"There are no programs in the community that could offer our folks the physical therapy and occupational therapy that they need," Carmen Reimer, director of the Sierra LifeNet Adult Day Health Center in Sonora (one of the facilities that would be affected by the legislation) told the source. "That was what we felt was really keeping them strong and independent."
The source states that nearly all of the services performed by these centers is covered through state and federal funding, and that the program's members pay little or nothing out of pocket.
Additionally, the cuts would hurt the economic development of the state's rural areas, sources say, as 7,600 jobs would also be lost.