More Needed

From Disability Scoop:
"Direct Support Workers In Short Supply As Demand Surges"

The commercial lasts less than a minute. Time enough, Ben Young hopes, for viewers to see what he needs and to imagine what he can give. “Come change my life,” Young says in a computer-generated voice. “I promise it will change yours forever. Help me help myself.” The pitch, from a bright and determined young man who can neither feed nor dress himself, or even speak clearly without aid of technology, is part of a statewide campaign to recruit the workers known as “direct support professionals.” The well-being of Young and tens of thousands of other Ohioans with developmental disabilities turns on the availability of competent and reliable support providers.  But the pool has gone frighteningly shallow.Companies and nonprofit agencies that offer care and support to people with disabilities say they are struggling more than ever to attract workers, forcing some to terminate services and decline new clients. Parents go without sleep and take leave from their jobs to fill in. Adults and children with disabilities become frustrated, confused or upset at the churn of names and faces and routines. “We have a workforce crisis on our hands that is of mammoth proportions,” said Mark Davis, president of the Ohio Provider Resource Association. Davis, whose organization represents agencies that employ direct-support workers, said surveys show employee turnover at 50 percent. Ten to 20 percent of jobs are vacant. About two-thirds of workers qualify for federal health-care assistance, and a majority put in overtime so people such as Young, who is severely affected by cerebral palsy, don’t go without critical services. “We believe that 76 percent of people are working six days a week,” Davis said.  Awareness is part of the problem. Many would-be workers simply don’t know about the demand or have a notion of how rewarding the field can be, Davis said. The bigger issue is pay. The average hourly wage for a direct-support provider in Ohio during 2016 was about $11.16 an hour — less than $24,000 a year. “We can’t pay a lot of money,” said Mark Schlater of Toward Independence, a nonprofit agency in southwestern Ohio that serves people with disabilities. “The regulations are huge; the responsibility is enormous. Why is it a train wreck? It’s out of balance.” Amy Hewitt, director of the Research and Training Center on Community Living at the University of Minnesota, said she understands why advocates and agencies are sounding an alarm. Yet nothing about the situation — in Ohio and throughout the United States — seems surprising. “You will hear providers talk about the workforce crisis, and they use that word,” she said. “It’s far worse than a crisis. Look it up in the dictionary — crises don’t last 30 years. This is a systemic failure that we’ve been dealing with for more than 30 years.” As more people with disabilities leave government-run institutions and work programs, the need for workers to assist them at home and in their communities has dramatically increased. The compensation of those who work for private companies and nonprofits, however, generally hasn’t matched that of public employees. Starting pay for a direct-support worker in Ohio at a state-run developmental center, for example, is nearly $16 per hour. “The way in which we’re able to afford community services and to argue that they’re less expensive,” Hewitt said, “is to pay staff less and get rid of their benefits.”  

^ This was a rather long (but good) article  - which as always you can see in-full in the link below. I worked with the disabled and know first-hand how hard it is, but at the same time it was more rewarding than any of my other jobs. It's a shame that our country won't not provide good benefits to potential caregivers so that they can support themselves and their families while they care for the disabled who need them. ^

https://www.disabilityscoop.com/2018/06/18/direct-support-short-supply/25202/