Three months from today, the nearly 300 nursing homes in Virginia will have to comply with a new state staffing rule that penalizes them up to $1,000 a day and threatens receivership for ongoing violations.
But Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) has threatened to make compliance more challenging by eliminating $10 million for nursing home direct care staff from the state budget. Worse yet, that would be compounded by the loss of more than $11 million in matching funds, creating a total loss of $43 million for nursing homes in the two years before a 2027 rebasing.
Youngkin tacked on the budget amendment last week as he worked to identify $300 million in savings ahead of expected loss of federal support and lower tax revenue. Providers now must convince lawmakers to restore the additional nursing home funding when the General Assembly reconvenes Wednesday to consider the governor’s various vetoes…