1 Commonwealth of Pennsylvania House Of

1 COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE BUDGET HEARING DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND DEPARTMENT OF DRUG & ALCOHOL PROGRAMS STATE CAPITOL HARRISBURG, PENNSYLVANIA ROOM 140, MAJORITY CAUCUS ROOM TUESDAY, MARCH 5, 2013 2:00 P.M. BEFORE: HONORABLE WILLIAM ADOLPH, MAJORITY CHAIRMAN HONORABLE JOSEPH MARKOSEK, MINORITY CHAIRMAN HONORABLE RYAN AUMENT HONORABLE KAREN BOBACK HONORABLE JIM CHRISTIANA HONORABLE GARY DAY HONORABLE GORDON DENLINGER HONORABLE BRIAN ELLIS HONORABLE GARTH EVERETT HONORABLE MAUREE GINGRICH HONORABLE GLEN GRELL HONORABLE SETH GROVE HONORABLE TOM KILLION HONORABLE DAVE MILLARD HONORABLE DUANE MILNE HONORABLE MARK MUSTIO HONORABLE DONNA OBERLANDER HONORABLE BERNIE O'NEILL HONORABLE MIKE PEIFER HONORABLE SCOTT PETRI HONORABLE JEFF PYLE HONORABLE CURT SONNEY HONORABLE BRENDAN BOYLE HONORABLE MATTHEW BRADFORD 2 1 (Cont'd.) HONORABLE MICHELLE BROWNLEE 2 HONORABLE MIKE CARROLL HONORABLE H. SCOTT CONKLIN 3 HONORABLE MADELEINE DEAN HONORABLE DEBERAH KULA 4 HONORABLE TIM MAHONEY HONORABLE MICHAEL O'BRIEN 5 HONORABLE CHERELLE PARKER HONORABLE JOHN SABATINA 6 HONORABLE STEVE SANTARSIERO HONORABLE JAKE WHEATLEY 7 8 ALSO PRESENT: 9 HONORABLE MATT BAKER HONORABLE GENE DIGIROLAMO 10 HONORABLE MIKE TOBASH HONORABLE SID KAVULICH 11 HONORABLE RICK SACCONE HONORABLE MIKE VEREB 12 HONORABLE NICK KOTIK HONORABLE PETER DALEY 13 HONORABLE MARCIA HAHN HONORABLE MARK KELLER 14 HONORABLE STEPHEN BLOOM HONORABLE TINA PICKETT 15 HONORABLE MINDY FEE HONORABLE JAMES CLAY 16 HONORABLE MIKE SCHLOSSBERG HONORABLE BECKY CORBIN 17 HONORABLE KERRY BENNINGHOFF HONORABLE DAN FRANKEL 18 HONORABLE BRYAN BARBIN HONORABLE MICHAEL O'BRIEN 19 20 DAVID DONLEY, MAJORITY EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR RITCHIE LAFAVER, MAJORITY DEPUTY EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR 21 DAN CLARK, ESQUIRE, MAJORITY CHIEF COUNSEL MIRIAM FOX, MINORITY EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR 22 BERYL KUHR, ESQUIRE, MINORITY LEGAL COUNSEL 23 TRACY L. MARKLE, 24 COURT REPORTER/NOTARY PUBLIC 25 3 1 INDEX TO TESTIFIERS NAME PAGE 2 MICHAEL WOLF, SECRETARY, 10 3 DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH 4 MARTIN RANIOWSKI, DEPUTY SECRETARY, 18 DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH 5 TERRY MATIO, DIRECTOR, BUDGET & FINANCE, -- 6 DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH 7 GARY TENNIS, SECRETARY, 4 DEPARTMENT OF DRUG & ALCOHOL PROGRAMS 8 KIM BOWMAN, DEPUTY SECRETARY, 87 9 DEPARTMENT OF DRUG & ALCOHOL PROGRAMS 10 TERRY MATULEVICH, DIRECTOR, -- BUREAU OF ADMINISTRATION & PROGRAM SUPPORT 11 FOR DEPARTMENT OF DRUG & ALCOHOL PROGRAMS 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 4 1 CHAIRMAN ADOLPH: Good afternoon, everyone. 2 I'd like to call to order the House Appropriations 3 Budget Hearing for the Department of Health, as well as 4 the Department of Drug and Alcohol Programs. 5 Welcome, everyone. 6 MR. TENNIS: Thank you. 7 MR. WOLF: Thank you. 8 CHAIRMAN ADOLPH: We certainly have a 9 crowded table up there, but we appreciate you being 10 here. Also present here is the chairman of our standing 11 committees for the Human Services Committee, the 12 Republican Chair, Gene DiGirolamo; he has joined us, as 13 well as the Health Committee Chairman, Matt Baker. And 14 the Democratic Chair may be on the way in. As they join 15 us, we will announce their presence. 16 So I'm not quite sure who wants to go first 17 with some opening testimony, but Secretary Tennis. 18 MR. TENNIS: Certainly. I'd be happy to go 19 first. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Chairman Markosek, 20 Chairman Baker, and Chairman DiGirolamo. 21 I want to first begin by saying we are a 22 very small department. We have 77 employees in our 23 department, and we handle an issue that affects one out 24 of four families in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, 25 just as it does with the rest of the nation. Untreated 5 1 addiction, as you all know, is a tremendous cost driver 2 throughout state government, Department of Corrections, 3 DPW, Health; and we've been -- because of the creation 4 of this department, we've been able to reach across to 5 different department secretaries and begin initiatives 6 right off the bat. 7 I'd like to begin by just explaining a 8 little bit about how the department works. We're broken 9 into three bureaus. There's a Bureau of Administration 10 that handles all of our fiscal matters, our grants 11 management training, those kinds of things; and that's 12 Terry Matulevich who handles that for the Bureau of Drug 13 and Alcohol Programs and has just done a brilliant job 14 in handling the challenges that we've been facing. Just 15 very, very pleased with him. 16 We have a new person we brought into state 17 government from Maryland. He ran five behind-the-walls 18 programs in Maryland in the Department of Corrections 19 there. Dr. Ken Martz is here, and he's in charge of our 20 Bureau of Prevention and Treatment Programs. And they 21 look at best practices; they look at sort of what is the 22 state of the art to be done in prevention and treatment; 23 and they pretty much inform everything we do. Our 24 largest bureau is the Bureau of Quality Assurance, and 25 we have -- I have -- this is Dr. Martz, and then Ramona 6 1 Wake, we've hired to head up our largest bureau of 2 quality assurance. We hired her out of upstate New 3 York. She has a career in quality assurance and a 4 passion for it. She has brought just real -- a fresh 5 eye and brilliance. 6 And before I go on any further, I want to 7 take one moment -- there is a career state employee who 8 retired who is the Director of our Licensure Division, 9 Cheryl Williams, for those in the field, who's a legend. 10 As she did, was really the model of integrity and 11 professionalism; she retired just about a 12 month-and-a-half ago, I believe. And I just wanted to 13 -- I think she must have had 30 or 40 years in state 14 government. I want to just take the opportunity to 15 publicly acknowledge her tremendous service. And she 16 left our division in wonderful shape. 17 We have been able to do -- and, Chairman, 18 I'm going to trust you to cut me off; because I'll talk 19 all day and I know that's not what you want. 20 CHAIRMAN ADOLPH: Well, I am counting the 21 minutes; but so far so good. 22 MR. TENNIS: Okay. We've been able -- I'm 23 going to give an example of what we've been able to do 24 because we're a department. One of the issues we've 25 looked at is what happens with people released from 7 1 county jail who need drug and alcohol treatment, which 2 is the majority of them actually. 3 The way it works now, the way that it has 4 worked for decades, is they were released from county 5 jail -- same thing from state prison -- they apply for 6 their Health Choices; they apply for their Medicaid, at 7 which point they go onto Health Choices; but it takes 8 some four to six to eight weeks for that to occur. And 9 during that interim period, we're paying for that 10 treatment with a hundred percent state dollars. 11 One of our jobs with the department is to 12 take the resources that you've given us and leverage as 13 much treatment as we can, because we know that that's a 14 lifesaving matter. 15 So what we have done, we have worked across 16 with the Board of Probation and Parole, the Department 17 of Corrections and with the Department of Public 18 Welfare, and we've set up a project. We're up now in 19 three counties, and we're going to be taking it 20 statewide to get the DPW applications, the Medicaid 21 applications processed before they're released. So the 22 day they walk out of jail, they're eligible for their 23 Health Choices. That means, as a practical matter, that 24 55 percent of their treatment is paid for with federal 25 dollars and 45 percent state. So our mission, the 8 1 mission of this department is to get as many people, 2 many of our untreated addicts and alcoholics into 3 recovery as we possibly can. And we know resources are 4 scarce. So our job is to take projects like that, which 5 we have four different departments working together 6 really in harmony in a tremendous team effort, that 7 we're going to be taking statewide to ensure that when 8 individuals who need residential treatment coming out of 9 prison, out of jail, will be able to get it the day they 10 walk out of jail with 55 percent federal match dollars. 11 We're doing the same kind of project with 12 the Department of Corrections and the Board of Probation 13 and Parole and DPW. We're going to be starting -- the 14 pilot counties now are Armstrong and Clarion County, and 15 we just started March 1st in Lycoming County. We're 16 going to be looking at a southeastern Pennsylvania 17 county to open it up from there, and then ultimately 18 we're just working the kinks out so we can take it 19 statewide. 20 At the State Department of Corrections 21 level, we have those individuals. And we know if you 22 look at their data, you'll see that some 79 percent of 23 them are in with alcohol or other drug problems. It 24 really is the driving factor for people getting involved 25 in the criminal justice system, as you know.

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