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Chapter 257 Update
Court to Hear Chapter 257 Complaint Tomorrow 

            

January 5, 2015 

 

Dear Collaborative Member,

 

After so many starts and stops, unfulfilled promises and frustrating uncertainty, the first steps toward clarity on the full implementation of Chapter 257 begins this week.

 

The venue will still be Beacon Hill,  but the decisions that will set  the direction of our future won't be made in the State House. Instead, they will be made on the 13th floor of the Suffolk  County Superior Court House, located behind the McCormack Building in Pemberton Square.

 

The first hearing for the lawsuit we filed against the Commonwealth last summer will be held  tomorrow, January 6, 2015 at 2 p.m. in Courtroom 1309.

 

Our frustrations with the repeated delays into the implementation of Chapter 257 are well documented. It is the Commonwealth's inability to set and fund all of the rates - despite having six years to do so - that has brought us to this point.

 

Gov.-elect Charles Baker, who will be inaugurated on Thursday, pledged his support of Chapter 257 during the campaign, saying at a  Providers' Council gubernatorial forum, "I can promise you as governor it will be funded."

 

We look forward to holding him to that promise, but that doesn't end the necessity of this complaint.

 

We filed this lawsuit after EOHHS's repeated failures to fully implement Chapter 257 this past July. In the suit we seek:

  • Full Implementation of Chapter 257 rates for programs still operating under old inadequate rates.

  • The setting of timely two-year reviews of all rates as required by Chapter 257.

  • Clarification that fair and adequate rates are a state mandate and not subject to any other interpretation other than the language contained in Chapter 257.

  • The fact that Chapter 257 means the actual paying of fair and adequate rates, not just the setting of rates.  

  • Adequate funds to provide safe, high quality programs to the people we serve.

We will keep you apprised of the legal proceedings.

 

Sincerely,

 

Bruce Bird, Vinfen

Scott Bock, Riverside Community Care

Gail Brown, New England Village

Deb Ekstrom, Community Healthlink, Inc.

Bill Lyttle, KEY, Inc.

Dan Mumbauer, High Point Treatment Center

Andy Pond, JRI

Bill Sprague, Bay Cove Human Services

Kathy Wilson , Behavioral Health Network