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Home Care Worker Initiative Enters Circulation

In-Home Supportive Services. Wages and Mandatory Training. Initiative Statute.

SACRAMENTO - Secretary of State Debra Bowen today announced the proponents of a new initiative may begin collecting petition signatures for their measure.

The Attorney General prepares the legal title and summary that is required to appear on initiative petitions. When the official language is complete, the Attorney General forwards it to the proponents and to the Secretary of State, and the initiative may be circulated for signatures. The Secretary of State then provides calendar deadlines to the proponents and to county elections officials. The Attorney General's official title and summary for the measure is as follows:

IN-HOME SUPPORTIVE SERVICES. WAGES AND MANDATORY TRAINING. INITIATIVE STATUTE. For workers providing home care services to the elderly, blind, and disabled pursuant to the state In-Home Supportive Services program, adds an amount to their hourly wage equal to any increase in the state minimum wage. Requires these workers to receive 75 hours of training in subjects such as personal care, disease management, diet, nutrition, physical activities, workplace safety, and consumer and provider roles and rights. Summary of estimate by Legislative Analyst and Director of Finance of fiscal impact on state and local government: State costs upwards of $600 million annually associated with the measure’s requirements to pay a wage supplement and provide paid training to In-Home Supportive Services (IHSS) providers, with costs growing with any future increases in the state-mandated hourly minimum wage. Potential state savings—not likely to exceed the low tens of millions of dollars annually—from reduced public assistance utilization by IHSS providers and a potential reduction in higher-cost publicly funded health care. (13-0052.)

The Secretary of State's tracking number for this measure is 1637 and the Attorney General's tracking number is 13-0052.

The proponents for the measure, Chris Salm and Malik Bennett, must collect signatures of 504,760 registered voters (five percent of the total votes cast for governor in the 2010 gubernatorial election) in order to qualify it for the ballot. The proponents have 150 days to circulate petitions for the measure, meaning the signatures must be submitted to county elections officials by June 30, 2014.

The proponents can be reached at (916) 442-2952.

To sign up for regular ballot measure updates via email, RSS feed, or Twitter, go to www.sos.ca.gov/multimedia.

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