At SRS, 3 in 10 positions unfilled

TOPEKA — Almost one-third of the central-office positions at the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services are vacant.

The vacancies are due to attrition and a year-long hiring freeze driven by shortfalls in state revenues.

"We’re at 30 percent (vacancy) in central office positions, 14 percent in the regional offices," SRS Secretary Don Jordan said during a meeting with stakeholders last week.

"We have more applications for assistance coming in and less people to handle them," he said.

SRS has budgeted for 2,902 positions in its 44 service centers; 825 positions in its central office. Currently, about 400 and 250 of these positions, respectively, are vacant.

Jordan noted that while the vacancies are stressful, they are not unusual during a recession.

"When you compare what we paid in salaries in 2008 with what we’re budgeted for in Fiscal Year 2010, we’ll be spending just under $23 million less," Jordan said. "That has a pretty steep impact."

Department spending, he said, was cut $38 million in Fiscal Year 2009, which ends June 30. It will be cut by at least another $44 million in Fiscal Year 2010.

Late last week, state officials announced that May revenues were $103.5 million less than projected. Further reductions in state spending are expected.

Jordan noted that when lawmakers in May passed a 2.75 percent across-the-board cut in state spending, 62 percent of the department’s $1.6 billion budget was considered “off the table” due to mandates, provisos and the need to preserve federal matching funds.

The remaining 38 percent of the department’s budget, he said, was expected to make up the difference.

"That 2.75 percent — when you got to the programs that could be cut — was more like 8 or 9 percent," Jordan said.

Hardest hit, he said, were community mental health centers, community based programs for the developmentally disabled, and MediKan and General Assistance programs.

MediKan and General Assistance are state-funded programs for adults who, generally, are not eligible for Medicaid, difficult to employ, and have not been able to qualify for federal disability payments.

Both programs, Jordan said, used to be "time limited" to 24 months, though extensions could be made in "hardship cases."

After July 1, MediKan and GA eligibility will be limited to 18 months with no hardship extensions. The average GA payment, Jordan said, will be cut from "about $180-$190 a month to $100 a month."

Letters notifying recipients of the changes were mailed last week, he said.

Jordan warned that another round of budget cuts would likely lead to the programs being eliminated altogether.

His staff, he said, is looking for ways to soften the cuts in services for the mentally ill and developmentally disabled.

"The session started out a challenge, it got worse, and it hasn’t gotten any better," Jordan said. "It’s a really tough year."

About 120 people — a mix of advocates, service providers, and SRS staff — attended the 90 minute session.

Jordan warned the group not to expect relief in the coming year. “I don’t see revenues roaring back anytime soon,” he said.

On other topics:

Asked whether SRS had plans for reducing the waiting list for Medicaid-funded in-home services for people with physical disabilities, Jordan noted that since imposing a "rolling waiting list" in December, spending has not declined as much as projected.

The waiting list, he said, likely will get longer in the coming months, not shorter.

Currently, at least 707 adults are on the so-called PD waiting list.
Jordan downplayed concerns that lawmakers had misspent federal stimulus money, using it to shore up the state general fund, rather than increasing access to social services.

" On my list of things to worry about, that’s not on there," he said.

Asked if SRS had plans for cutting its support for consumer run organizations — Keys for Networking and National Alliance of Mental Illness-Kansas, primarily — Jordan replied, "Not so far, no."

The department, he said, spends less than $1 million on CROs annually.

"We get a lot of bang for our buck from consumer run organizations," he said. "And if we cut them, they would have absolutely no where else for them to go. It would be a death knell."
Jordan encouraged advocates in the audience to quit focusing on "the size of their piece of the (budget) pie," and, instead, concentrate on the "size of the pie, overall."

Asked if SRS should have fought to hold onto more stimulus money, Jordan asked the group to realize that every state agency is struggling to keep its budget in the black.

"It’s not like we could have been the only house on the block that didn’t burn down," he said.

-Dave Ranney is a staff writer for KHI News Service, which specializes in coverage of health issues facing Kansans. He can be reached at dranney@khi.org or at 785-233-5443, ext. 128.