Hundreds of Stan Chesley's former clients get $23.5 million settlement in fen-phen case

Attorney Stan Chesley

CINCINNATI - Years after hundreds of Stan Chesley’s clients sued to recover money he allegedly stole from their diet drug case, a federal judge announced a $23.5 million settlement on Wednesday.

In a few days the 382 victims of a fen-phen lawsuit filed two decades ago will finally receive money that their attorneys allegedly skimmed from their settlement with the drug maker.

“Some of them had such significant health problems because of the drug; they did lose everything,” said Lexington attorney Angela Ford. “Nearly all of them have had some degree of loss of faith in the justice system … I ran out of excuses to give them years ago for the case dragging on and moving in so many different directions.”

The settlement puts an end to the federal case against Chesley’s former law firm, Waite Schneider Bayless & Chesley, which harbored many of Chesley’s assets after he was disbarred in 2013. It also dismisses eight other related state court cases.

The settlement removes any future claims against Chesley’s wife, U.S. District Judge Susan Dlott, for assets she may have received from her husband.

But the settlement does not end the federal case, or any state lawsuit, against Chesley individually.
“None of these actions have changed his conduct, or his demeanor, or his sense of responsibility for the people he stole from,” Ford said.

In June the federal Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati issued a scathing rebuke of Chesley and his “scheme” to avoid paying a $42 million judgment dating back four years.

“For years … Stanley Chesley appears to have been orchestrating a high-stakes shell game in an effort to escape a long-overdue multi-million dollar judgment. In the process, he has defrauded hundreds of judgment creditors, many of who are plaintiffs here,” judges wrote in the opinion.

A Kentucky state court issued a judgment nearly four years ago against Chesley for $42 million he owed his former clients. Since then, those victims have been trying to collect.

U.S. District Judge Robert Cleland, a visiting judge from Michigan, approved a settlement this week, which finally makes them whole on that $42 million debt. But they are still owed tens of millions in long-overdue interest on that money, Ford said.

“Chesley has been successfully evading them with the help of his confidantes. In the process, five lawyers have been disbarred; two have been put in jail,” the appeals court wrote. “Through it all, Chesley has managed to transfer most of his assets elsewhere rendering himself judgment-proof.”

An attorney for Chesley did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The story behind the case began in 1998 when Chesley joined three attorneys in a class-action lawsuit against American Home Products, the maker of the diet drug fen-phen. In 2001, attorneys negotiated a settlement of more than $200 million, for injuries to their clients from the drug’s side effects. The drug maker left it up to the lawyers to divvy up the settlement.

“So the fraud began,” the appeals court wrote. “The lawyers, at least for the time being, made out like bandits.”

The fallout from the scheme has been sweeping. Five lawyers and a judge have been permanently disbarred. Two of Chesley’s accomplices were convicted of wire fraud and are serving prison time.

Chesley avoided prosecution by testifying against his co-counsel, according to the appeals order.

After years of trying to collect their judgment in state court, the victims filed a federal suit in 2016 to unwind the assets that Chesley had transferred to his law firm and a trust set up by another attorney, Thomas Rehme.

As part of the settlement, a federal judge issued a permanent injunction freezing those assets and preventing Chesley from ever receiving them.

In May 2017, many of Chesley’s former clients traveled to Cincinnati to protest outside of the Hamilton County Courthouse.

“There’s some of us who are going to die before this is all over with and I might be one of them,” Evelyn Hopkins, of Florida, told reporters then. “It’s destroyed me, it’s destroyed my family.”

Hopkins, who has a pacemaker, stents in her heart and a leaky heart valve caused by the diet drug, lost her home and had to move in with her daughter.

“It wouldn’t hurt him to pay us and he probably wouldn’t even miss it, he’s got so much,” Hopkins said. “I live with my daughter. I live in a bedroom because I can’t afford anything else. I’m on food stamps.”

The $22.5 million settlement will be distributed to victims based on the amounts that were stolen from them in the original fen-phen settlement, Ford said.

“The door is open to collect additional money from him (Chesley),” Ford said.

Connie Centers, a victim from Kentucky, told reporters that some have died awaiting their settlement money.

“Our lives have been destroyed … all this time they’re spending this money on filing this appeal and this appeal, paying out all these fees,” Centers said. “And we’re living in poverty, we can’t pay our bills, can’t get our medicines because of our heart problems. It can’t go on, it has just got to stop.

“The judicial system, I used to believe in it. The judicial system now, I have no faith in it. I’ve lost it for 17 years."

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Hundreds of Stan Chesley's former clients get $23.5 million settlement in fen-phen case

Staunton man charged with bilking elderly victim out of thousands of dollars

WAYNESBORO - A suspected con artist who is already facing charges in Staunton was arrested last week in Waynesboro after being accused of bilking a 92-year-old man out of more than $25,000, according to police.

Police said the suspect, 50-year-old Andre R. Patterson, of Staunton, met the elderly man earlier this year while doing yard work for a neighbor of the victim.

Patterson eventually began telling the man tales of woe, one involving a story that his wife was slain in Baltimore, Maryland, and another concerning a niece who was supposedly raped and later died at the University of Virginia Medical Center in Charlottesville, according to the Waynesboro Police Department.

"Made up stuff," said Sgt. Fred Smith.

In September, Patterson talked the elderly man into loaning him some money, Smith said. Patterson pledged to pay the man back with proceeds from property he was selling in New Jersey, but told the man he needed additional cash for closing costs on the deal, Smith said. Patterson then reportedly pocketed that money as well.

Smith said police don't believe Patterson was married, and said there are no property records to support his claim of owning land in New Jersey.

"None of this exists," the sergeant said.

In all, the elderly man was swindled out of $26,200. Smith said Patterson is suspected of getting the cash through several visits. Adult Protective Services alerted police to the alleged scam.

Patterson is charged in Waynesboro with five counts of obtaining money by false pretenses, court records show.

In May, Staunton authorities charged Patterson with 13 counts of financial exploitation of a mentally incapacitated person in an unrelated case where he reportedly stole more than $5,000 from a 55-year-old Staunton man who suffers from a mental disability.

In the Staunton case, Patterson allegedly told the man he needed the cash to help jumpstart a new business, according to an arrest report. The Staunton Police Department said there is no evidence Patterson started a business.

Court records show Patterson was convicted in 2014 of misdemeanor welfare fraud. Two felony charges of making a false application for welfare assistance were not prosecuted.

Patterson, who had been free on bond in the Staunton case, is now being held at Middle River Regional Jail without bond.

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Staunton man charged with bilking elderly victim out of thousands of dollars

KYW Exclusive: Search for grandmother’s body exposes cracks in the system

PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — After 85-year-old Ruth Pasley died in a Philadelphia nursing home last New Year’s Eve, she was quietly laid to rest in Montgomery County, so quietly that her family had no idea for more than six months.

Accounts of her case, provided exclusively to KYW Newsradio, not only expose a family’s heartbreak but also raise red flags about cracks in the state’s guardianship system.

Cherri Gregg | KYW Newsradio

“It still hurts”

David Wilson is still trying to come to grips with his grandmother’s death. Coping with a slew of family illnesses recently meant he hadn’t gone to visit his grandmother, known to loved ones as “Miss Ruth,” since before the holidays in 2017.

“Once my father passed, it was on me,” he told KYW Newsradio. “It still hurts. All I want to know is what happened to my grandmother, when, and why we weren’t informed.”

Miss Ruth had dementia and lived in the community with help from neighbors and friends. But when her son died in 2014 and those friends aged, the Pennsylvania Corporation for Aging stepped in. During a hearing in June of 2015, the court appointed attorney James Tyler as her legal guardian. Wilson said he did not object to the appointment.

Eventually, according to the family, Tyler moved Miss Ruth to Cheltenham Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, a facility 26 miles from her old North Philadelphia neighborhood near 17th Street and Susquehanna Avenue.

"During that time, I had a heart attack, I had cancer," said Sandra Pasley, 71, Miss Ruth’s daughter-in-law. "There were a lot of things going on." She and other family members lost touch. "But still, I used to try to visit her when I could," she said.

When Miss Ruth died, representatives from Cheltenham said they called the guardian. But, the family told KYW Newsradio, no one called them.

The Pennsylvania Corporation for Aging declined to comment on the case, citing confidentiality issues.

"I am very upset," said Sandra Pasley.

Cherri Gregg | KYW Newsradio

A “semi-private plot”

On July 8, Wilson visited Cheltenham and discovered his grandmother no longer lived here. He was told to call Miss Ruth’s guardian. He said when he called Tyler the next day, he was told Miss Ruth had died, but Tyler would not tell him where she was buried.

"He told us to call this person, talk to that person," said David Wilson. "I really want to hurt that man. I really want to hurt him."

It took Wilson weeks of calls, visits to the nursing home and calls to local funeral homes to find out that Miss Ruth was buried Jan. 10 at Fairview Cemetery in Willow Grove, in Montgomery County.  On Aug. 8, he took the 45-minute ride to his grandmother’s final resting place with his mother, Sandra, and sister, Ashley.

"This is bull crap man," said Ashley. "There's no name, no nothing. How do we even know that our grandmother is here?"

Sandra Pasley burst into tears. "She can't stay here," she bellowed. "She can't stay here!"

Wayne Luker, Fairview's president, told the family the cemetery received a direct order for burial. He said there were no chairs set up, and Miss Ruth was buried in a semi-private plot — with four other bodies. He says the cemetery was told that there was no family. The burial cost $900.

"We’re going to have to do something," said Wilson. "Everything she needed funeral-wise, we had. She deserved better than this."

Cracks in the system

Wilson said he believed that having a guardian meant his grandmother would be okay and that the family would be notified if there were problems.

However, notifying next of kin is not required under the state’s guardianship laws.

"There are people who feel, especially if they are not local or close family, that if they have a guardian they are taken care of," said Diane Menio, executive director of CARIE, a nonprofit that advocates for the elderly in Pennsylvania. She said guardianship laws in Pennsylvania fail to adequately protect seniors.

Cherri Gregg | KYW Newsradio

"The statute, as it exists now, it requires people to report," she said, "but it doesn't require a whole lot beyond that."

Under the rules, guardians are not even required to visit their clients.

"We recommend once a month, but that rarely happens," said Menio.

In order to do a thorough job, Menio said a guardian would have to call and check in, visit and communicate with the family of his or her client. The only problem is compensation. Many of those needing a court-appointed guardian are poor and have family who are unable or unwilling to put forth the type of effort required to adequately take care of an incapacitated person. Monthly pay for such services from poor seniors is only $100 a month. In order to make ends meet, some guardians will run a volume business, taking on many clients and doing the bare minimum. Additionally, the courts are understaffed and provide limited oversight.

"They don't have the type of resources they need to do monitoring," said Menio.

In response to an inquiry from KYW Newsradio, the Philadelphia Orphans Court wrote that James Tyler, the attorney appointed to Miss Ruth's case, has one of the larger guardian caseloads. Multiple sources say he has scores of guardianship clients. According to the annual reports his office filed with the Orphans Court, Tyler earned at least $1100 a year for providing guardianship to Miss Ruth from June of 2015 until her death in December of 2017. Those filings show that he visited Miss Ruth only one time, for 10 minutes, during those two and a half years. Mr. Tyler did not respond to repeated requests for comment.

Pennsylvania has nearly 2.7 million residents age 60 and older, and that number will hit 3.3 million by 2020. Thousands of seniors and infirm individuals have state approved guardians who are supposed to protect their rights, but the law requires only that guardians do what's in the "best interest" of an incapacitated individual and the specifics are left for interpretation.

"It's time consuming to be able to do what you need to do," said Keelin Barry, a Philadelphia-based attorney with an elder law practice in Center City. She also sits on the Pennsylvania Elder Law Task Force and is a guardian for 37 seniors. "I think, really, it's unclear what a guardian should be doing," she said.

Cherri Gregg | KYW Newsradio

What can be done?

In 2014, the task force delivered a 284-page report to help the Pennsylvania Supreme Court better protect elders from abuse and neglect, including 130 specific recommendations. Some included mandatory training for guardians on ethics and liability, a bill of rights for seniors and family and more.

"We need to have a stronger system for supporting guardianship," Barry said.

One effort to improve the system is the Guardianship Tracking System that is scheduled to roll out this year. In a promo video created by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court and released last month, judges explain that GTS will allow guardians to file reports online and send email reminders.

"It will allow judges to put red flags on guardians who may have done something wrong," Barry said.

GTS supporters like Barry are hoping it will provide a statewide tracking system, something that is currently lacking since filing practices vary from county to county. Last year, it was discovered that a woman convicted of fraud was serving as guardian on a total of 100 cases in three different counties, prompting lawmakers to propose a bill for guardian background checks. Advocates are hoping these reforms and others will close the cracks in the system.

Meanwhile, David Wilson is still living with the guilt of relying on others to care for his grandma Ruth.

"I do feel bad because I didn't get a chance to get out there and do what I should had been doing," he said. "Even though there’s a power of attorney, that doesn't mean they'll take care."

Wilson’s focus now is saying goodbye to his grandmother.

On Wed am on @KYWNewsradio tune into part one of #WheresGrandma. When 85yo #MissRuth died last NYE she was quietly laid to rest, so quietly it took 6 mos for her family to find out. We’ll explain how the case exposes cracks in guardianship law. Livestream: https://t.co/eubGbkvrHY pic.twitter.com/ATFuJNfhy9

— Cherri Gregg (@cherrigregg) October 16, 2018

"We wanted to give her a proper home going," he said.

It will cost thousands to move Miss Ruth from the grave in Willow Grove to Eden Cemetery in Philadelphia, where her son and the rest of the family are buried. Wilson says it's money the family does not have, but they'll work on a solution and take the lesson to heart.

"Try do whatever you can," said Wilson. "Just go see your loved ones."

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KYW Exclusive: Search for grandmother’s body exposes cracks in the system

Son charged for stealing $153,168 from 86-year-old father, officials talk elder abuse warning signs

LOWER SWATARA TOWNSHIP, DAUPHIN COUNTY, Pa. - More than $150,000 is stolen from an 86-year-old man and police say it was his son and daughter-in-law who did it.

Chester Robert Garman III and  Kathy Alice Garman are facing charges of felony theft and access device fraud for allegedly stealing $153,168 from Chester's father over a four year period.

"This case is the fourth biggest financial case since 2004," said Dauphin County Commissioner George Hartwick.

Dauphin County officials are using the Garman's elder financial abuse case as a reminder for people to keep an eye on people ages 60 and older for signs of abuse, neglect or financial exploitation. Reports of elder abuse in the county continue to increase year after year. So far this year, the county has received more than $1,600 reports of elder abuse.

"In Dauphin County we want to make it clear that if there are suspected abuses occurring, that we will take actions," said Hartwick. "We are communicating and we will do everything to make sure we are protecting out seniors and bring those individuals who perpetrate those crimes to justice."

In most elder abuse cases, like the Garman's, the abuse is done by someone they know and trust. The Dauphin County Area Agency on Aging says there are many signs of abuse. Anytime anyone notices anything they think is questionable, they can call the agency anonymously and they can look into it.

Dauphin County District Attorney Fran Chardo says, to help prevent financial abuse of an elder, have a power of attorney especially once someone has a caregiver, even if they are a family member. He says without it, it can be a license to steal.

"You want to have clear delineation of what the obligations are of the caregiver to the person receiving the care," said Chardo.

For more information on the Dauphin County Area Agency on Agings and how to report suspected elder abuse click here.



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Son charged for stealing $153,168 from 86-year-old father, officials talk elder abuse warning signs

8 years prison for Nevada woman for elder exploitation

CARSON CITY, Nev. (AP) — A 62-year-old northern Nevada woman has been sentenced to up to eight years in prison for guardianship abuse of her 93-year-old father.

Nevada Attorney General Adam Laxalt announced the sentencing Monday of Vicky Jo Adams of Douglas County for exploiting an older person and converting funds entrusted to her for her personal use between April and December 2017.

Prosecutors say she defrauded John Lindblade of more than $260,000.

In addition to sentencing Adams to 30 to 96 months in prison, Judge James Todd Russell ordered her to pay $264,000 in restitution.

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8 years prison for Nevada woman for elder exploitation

85-Year-Old Grandmother Buried With Strangers, Family Didn’t Find Out About Her Death Until 7 Months Later

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) — A family of an 85-year-old grandmother who died in a Philadelphia nursing home last New Year’s Eve didn’t find out she passed away until seven months later.

Ruth Pasley, 85, died at the Cheltenham Nursing and Rehabilitation Center on New Year’s Eve and was quietly laid to rest in Montgomery County.

“No name, no nothing,” said granddaughter Ashley Wilson. “How do we know that my grandmother is here?”

“All I want to know is what happened to my grandmother and why we were not informed,” said grandson David Wilson.

A retired teacher’s aide, Pasley lived on her own for years, but when her son died and dementia set in, the court appointed a legal guardian.

The guardian moved Pasley to the rehab center 26 miles away. The family last saw her in December. When she died later that month, the nursing home called the guardian, but no one in the family.

Wilson says he asked the guardian where his grandmother was buried but he would not tell them. It took weeks of effort to discover Pasley’s body lies in a Montgomery County grave with four strangers.

There is currently no requirement in the law the guardian needs to stay in touch with the family.

“As it exists now, the statute requires people to report, but it doesn’t require a whole lot beyond that,” said CARIE executive director Diane Menio.

While visits and calls to clients and the family are needed for a guardian to do a thorough job, it is not required. Courts are understaffed and guardians earn only $100 a month from poor seniors, so some guardians do a volume business and perform minimum duties.

According to court filings, Pasley’s guardian visited her once in two-and-a-half years.

There are efforts being made to try to tighten things up. In 2014, the Pennsylvania Elder Law Taskforce released a report with 130 recommendations. One reform is the Guardianship Tracking System, which launches this year. Other recommendations include mandatory training, a bill of rights for seniors and family, and background checks.



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85-Year-Old Grandmother Buried With Strangers, Family Didn’t Find Out About Her Death Until 7 Months Later

Beware of scams: The grandkids scam is among several that could be costly to seniors

Tulsa Police developed the Senior Services Unit in 2002 to combat crimes against seniors.

In 2017 alone, Tulsa County received over 2,200 referrals and reports of crimes against seniors. To combat such offenses, two detectives, a supervisor, and a full-time volunteer share the caseload of reports filed with the Tulsa Police Department.

Working hand-in-hand with local agencies, the goal is to protect the vulnerable adult population as well as the seniors in the Tulsa community. This protection is often found in educating seniors.

The Senior Services Unit combats crimes such as financial exploitation, elder neglect, physical abuse, caretaker neglect, identity theft, credit card fraud, and all types of scams targeting the senior population.

Grandkids scam, IRS scam, jury duty scam, and the love scam are some of the top choices the bad guys will use to get money from seniors.

Grandkids scam

The victim, usually a senior, receives a phone call from someone pretending to be their grandchild.

Once you answer the phone and say hello, the suspect will say, “Grandma,” then the senior may answer, “Is that you John?” And the suspect immediately answers, “Yes, Grandma, it’s John.”

Then the caller, or suspect, will continue the conversation and tell the senior that he’s in jail or recently got in a car wreck and needs money to either bail out of jail or receive medical treatment. They may even hand the phone over to a cohort who pretends to be an attorney or doctor.

Often, these suspects ask for money through an Apple iTunes gift card or some other type of gift card.

The easiest thing for seniors to do is to hang up. Your grandchildren should never request you send them money via a gift card over the phone. You can send your grandchildren gift cards through the mail, but never give gift card information over the phone.

You must verify where your grandchild is and verify their location with their parents. Often times, the suspect on the phone will ask you not to call their parents, because they are too scared to let them know. But remember, this is your money you will lose.

Never give someone a gift card over the phone. This is a scam.

IRS scam

The IRS will never contact you about warrants because of missed payments or discuss your past due taxes over the phone.

In rare cases, an agent will contact you if you are part of an identity theft investigation you initiate — but they always start the investigation by mail.

Never give money over the phone to the IRS.

Jury duty

The Tulsa County Court Clerk will never call you and say you have a warrant because you missed jury duty. A letter is often sent by mail to the juror, but a phone call will never occur.

Did you know most seniors are excused from jury duty due to their age or mobility? If you receive a notice for jury duty, follow the directions on the information card.

If you receive a phone call stating you missed jury duty and there’s a warrant for your arrest, hang up. This is a scam.

You will be notified by mail if a warrant for your arrest exists; you will never be asked to pay for a warrant using a gift card.

Love scam

Some seniors seek companionship on the internet or to find true love. In some rare cases, this type of matchmaking works.

Seniors are preyed upon hard when finding the right one online. The suspect uses your vulnerability to their advantage. Many of these suspects start communication by email, then text messages, and sometimes will talk to you for hours over the phone.

They may be in foreign countries or other states and will start to ask you for money to help them buy a plane ticket or gas money so they can come and see you.

Never give money to someone you have never met. This scam often goes unreported, because people are embarrassed and will never tell someone.

If you have never met your true love in person and only online; never send them money of any type. This is a scam.

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Beware of scams: The grandkids scam is among several that could be costly to seniors

Dauphin County task force to release more info on elder abuse investigation

HARRISBURG, Pa. (WHTM) - Dauphin County's Elder Abuse Task Force is expected to announce more information about a couple accused of stealing more tan $150,000 from an elderly relative.

Police arrested Chester "Rob" and Kathy Garman. Investigators said they used an 86-year-old relative's credit card and accessed his bank cards without his knowledge from 2013-2017.

The case is the 4th largest sum of money involved in a financial exploitation case since the task force was formed in 2004.

The task force will hold a press conference Monday at 10 a.m. at the Dauphin County Administration Building in Harrisburg. 

Full Article & Source:
Dauphin County task force to release more info on elder abuse investigation

See Also:
New details on arrest of couple accused of stealing $153K from elderly relative coming Monday

The U.S. needs more home care workers. Is this the solution?

Click to Watch Video

America's home care shortage is critical, and growing. The industry's shortage seems to be driven by low wages, few benefits and a lack of respect for workers, 90 percent of whom are women. Would giving them more responsibilities and more training help workers earn more? In the second part of our reporting, economics correspondent Paul Solman takes a closer look at whether there is a solution.

Read the Full Transcript

• William Brangham:
  
  Many of us say we want to stay at home as we grow into old age.
  
  But as economics correspondent Paul Solman recently reported, the country is facing a shortage of home care workers, the very people who can make staying at home possible.
  
  Tonight, Paul looks at efforts to address that shortage. It's part of our weekly series, Making Sense.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  America's home care shortage is critical and growing.
  
  
• Woman:
  All right, Tom, come sit down for breakfast.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  Right now, 90 percent are women, who help older adults and people with disabilities get through the daily tasks of living at home.
  The key drivers of the shortage, according to gerontologist Clare Luz.
  
  
• Clare Luz:
  Low wages.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  Right.
  
  
• Clare Luz:
  Virtually no benefits, lack of guaranteed hours and lack of respect. Those are the big-ticket items.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  The pay? A national average of $10.49 an hour. And that's not nearly enough to make up the shortage, says MIT management professor Paul Osterman.
  
  
• Paul Osterman:
  We have to find ways to make these jobs for these home aides better jobs, so more people are willing to do the work.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  On the demand side, the reason is obvious and pressing, the number of elderly and disabled in need of assistance is expected to double in the next 25 years.
  
  
• Paul Osterman:
  It's going to put tremendous pressure on unpaid family members to step in, but they're not going to be there in the numbers that we need.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  There aren't enough Hellen (ph) Kwants, that is. She's been caring for the elderly since she arrived from Colombia at age 22.
  
  You're now how old?
  
  
• Hellen Kwant:
  Eighty-seven.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  And you're still doing it? How old is the person you're taking care of?
  
  
• Hellen Kwant:
  Eighty-seven.
  
  (LAUGHTER)
  
• Paul Solman:
  Hellen's daughter, Martha,` is also a home care worker.
  
  
• Martha Kwant:
  My mom raised us to care for our elderly neighbors, so since we were knee-high to boll weevils, we were taking food and helping do this.
  
  
• Hellen Kwant:
  Yes, we adopted like a grandma.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  But Martha wonders if the rest of her fellow Americans are equipped to take in aging relatives.
  
  
• Martha Kwant:
  As a society, we're not so good about having the patience, as other cultures do, to have family move in, or to have that person move in with family and soften the approach to that ledge and the fall. That's not something most Americans are prepared to do.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  So, what to do?
  
  In his book "Who Will Care For Us?" Osterman argues home care workers should be given more responsibilities, like managing chronic conditions, and especially more training.
  
  
• Paul Osterman:
  If they could do more they would be more productive. That would justify better compensation for them, which would mean that more people would enter into the market, and we will be able to avoid the shortages we will inevitably face as the baby boom ages.
  
  
• Woman:
  I'm tearing that off. I'm not touching my hand.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  At a recent session in Grand Ledge, Michigan, called Building Training, Building Quality, or BTBQ, experienced home care workers were learning how to train new employees.
  
  BTBQ curriculum provides baseline training for home care workers. The goal is to attract and retain more people, because last year the industry had a median turnover rate of 67 percent.
  
  
• Alyssa Lawrence:
  We're constantly looking for other ways to retain our staff.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  Participant Alyssa Lawrence thinks more training could lead to higher job satisfaction among her employees.
  
  
• Alyssa Lawrence:
  We're trying to break that stigma of you're just a home health aide, so this way we're looking at trying to better educate them, better train them and hopefully retain our staff a lot better.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  But here's the problem, more training in no way guarantees higher pay.
  
  
• Wendy Martin:
  I was gobsmacked on how little they pay for this.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  After Wendy Martin (ph) lost her automotive job, she decided to run a home care agency with her mom.
  
  If your work force is better qualified because they have gotten the training that you're learning how to give, are they going to earn more money?
  
  
• Wendy Martin:
  Probably not.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  The reason for that is, most long-term home care is paid for through Medicaid.
  
  
• Paul Osterman:
  The financing system is a tremendous challenge. Medicaid has to compete with education and public safety for resources. Medicaid today caps what you can do for these aides in terms of compensation.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  But, he says, if home care workers were better-trained and higher-paid, Medicaid and insurance companies would actually benefit economically, because patients would avoid more expensive medical care.
  
  
• Paul Osterman:
  Fewer emergency room visits, fewer readmissions into hospitals. Secondly, they will save money because they could shift some work from higher paid folks, largely nurses, to these aides. And they will save money because they will avoid unneeded nursing home entrances.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  Clare Luz says the Michigan training program has already provided evidence of cost-saving.
  
  
• Clare Luz:
  We were able to demonstrate empirically an association between this comprehensive training program and expensive client outcomes, like falls and emergency room visits.
  
  Just from an economic standpoint, a business standpoint, it's foolish not to be looking at this work force.
  
  
• Henrietta Ivey:
  Your hair is very, very curly and pretty.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  Henrietta Ivey has many years of experience, but she says when workers like her care for clients dependent on government reimbursements in her native Detroit, the pay is still a measly $9.50 an hour.
  
  
• Henrietta Ivey:
  They tell you, get skilled, get trained. And we do get skilled and get trained, but that money has not changed. It hasn't.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  After talking to her for a while, I wondered, could Ivey cater to private clients who could afford to pay more out-of-pocket to a loving, seasoned pro like her?
  
  Maybe it's that there is a big entrepreneurial opportunity.
  
  
• Henrietta Ivey:
  You have got a good point there, but say, for example, me and a group of home care workers say, you know what, let's just start a home care agency.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  Right.
  
  
• Henrietta Ivey:
  If we don't have money saved, which we don't, because we don't make any money to save anything to think on that level, those are our barriers. When you don't have that money for your basic needs, those types of ideas are just ideas for us.
  
  We work, we sweat!
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  So Ivey has become an activist with the Service Employees International Union to press for higher wages.
  
  
• Henrietta Ivey:
  Somewhere, somebody is going to snap and say, you know what? We see the problem here now. It ain't that people don't want to work. It's not that people are not smart enough. We're not paying them enough.
  
  That's what I like to hear, that sizzle.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  And, says Paul Osterman, if we want there to be more home care workers like Henrietta Ivey around when we need their services, we will have to advocate for them too.
  
  
• Paul Osterman:
  We're going to need help, and we're going to wonder where it is and why it's not forthcoming. And then we will complain. And there will hopefully be a politician who will see it in his or her interest to make this their issue.
  
  
• Paul Solman:
  For the "PBS NewsHour," this is economics correspondent Paul Solman reporting from Michigan.
  
  
• Henrietta Ivey:
  You're welcome.
  
  

Full Article & Source:
The U.S. needs more home care workers. Is this the solution?