1 February 8, 2021 Ma/ta PUBLIC HEALTH COMMITTEE 9:00 a.m. PUBLIC HEARING CHAIRPERSON: Representative Jonathan Steinberg CO-CHAIRPERSON: Senator Abrams Daugherty Abrams SENATORS: Abrams, Anwar, Lesser, Somers REPRESENTATIVES: Arnone, Berger, Betts, Carpino, Cook, Dauphinais, Demicco, Elliott, Foster, Genga, Gilchrest, Green, Kavros, Kennedy, Klarides, Linehan, McCarty, Parker, Petit, Ryan, Scanlon, Steinberg, Tercyak, Young, Zupkus REP. STEINBERG (136TH): Okay, very good. I don't see Senator Somers on the call yet, unless I'm mistaken, but we can always come back to her later. If there are no other comments, we will begin with the Public Hearing, and as I mentioned, we will start with the basic rules, the protocols for how this meeting will be conducted. Obviously, this being our first Public Hearing, this is a new process for many of us. Yes, we've all participated in informational forums and some Public Hearings during the special session, but we also recognize that, given the difference of Zoom calls, there could be some technical problems during the Hearing. In fact, I'm willing to guarantee it will happen sooner or later, and we are asking everyone, please be patient, be tolerant, as we work through 2 February 8, 2021 Ma/ta PUBLIC HEALTH COMMITTEE 9:00 a.m. PUBLIC HEARING these challenges. We will try to make this as glitch-free as we can. Please be reminded that Public Hearings are live- streamed and recorded in accordance with CGA requirements, and indeed, some hearings will actually be covered on CTN, as well. The first hour of the Hearing is reserved for public officials. If there are public officials remaining after the first hour, we will move to members of the public and then alternate between both groups. Today, we have only roughly about a half dozen public officials, so that should go pretty quickly. Registrants can be removed from the hearing platform upon the completion of your testimony, in fact, they will be removed. So you have your time, you can be asked questions by Members of the Committee, and then you'll be removed from the hearing platform, and then you can continue to watch the hearing via YouTube Live or on CTN, if we're covered by CTN. Committee Members, please, you must go to the participant icon or the reaction icon at the bottom of your screen and click on, "Raise hand" when you wish to speak. Please wait to be recognized by the Chair. Microphones should remain on mute prior to entering the Hearing and when not speaking in order to enhance the meeting etiquette and avoid unnecessary and random interruptions. Background noise can get difficult to concentrate. Committee staff will help keep members on mute. Use of chat, either public or private is not allowed. All chat records are saved by default and therefore could be subject to FOIA request. 3 February 8, 2021 Ma/ta PUBLIC HEALTH COMMITTEE 9:00 a.m. PUBLIC HEARING If your connection drops, or you close out of the Public Hearing by accident, please rejoin using the link provided by the Committee. Committee Members, if you encounter difficulties entering the Public Hearing, please contact the Chairs, Ranking Members or public health Committee staff for assistance. And lastly, we are very proud of the way in which this Committee operates with a measure of civility and respect for all participants, we would ask that all of our people testifying behave in the same fashion. The vast majority of folks are really good, but if you violate basic norms of civility, if you attack Members of the Committee or the Legislature or virtually anybody, we do reserve the right to cut you off, and we'd hate to have to do that. So, we remind you to stay on topic, and to not make this personal. It's very important to us that we give everybody a chance to be heard without any concern about intimidation. And if we all model the right behavior, I'm sure this hearing will go well. That's pretty much it for the rules, unless anybody else would like to comment on that. I see Representative Petit, your hand is up? REP. PETIT (22ND): Yes Mr. Chairman. I assume we're going to use the raised hand function to queue up, number one. And number two. Representative Betts has had difficulty entering into the meeting. Thank you. REP. STEINBERG (136TH): So, let's make sure we get Representative Betts into the meeting. Any other comments or questions? If not, we look at our agenda today, and the first up to speak is Commissioner Schiff, of the Department of Developmental Services. I believe he'll be joined by a couple of his people, 4 February 8, 2021 Ma/ta PUBLIC HEALTH COMMITTEE 9:00 a.m. PUBLIC HEARING though they may speak intervally. Commissioner Scheff, the floor is yours. Good morning. COMMR. JORDAN SCHEFF: Good morning and thank you. I'm going to break my tradition of trying to speak to you extemporaneously, and for the sake of time, and our newfound way of interacting together, read a much-abbreviated version of my written testimony. So please indulge me. Senators Abrams, Summers and Hwang, Representative Steinberg and Petit and members of the Public Health Committee, I am Jordan Scheff, Commissioner of the Department of Developmental Services. Thank you for the opportunity to testify in support of Senate Bill No. 416. This Bill implements numerous recommendations of the Department that improve and advance the important work of our agency. As this Bill contains five separate department proposals, I would like to take this opportunity to summarize and explain each of the sections of the Bill. A written testimony provides additional detailed background and explanation on each section of the bill. Section 1, current State law outlines with which State agencies and other entities, DDS may share its abuse and neglect registry information. Specifically, the statute currently details that the department may make registry information available to DCF, DHMS and DSS for the purpose of determining whether an applicant from employment appears on our registry. As Governor Lamont's Executive Order Number 2 called for the centralization of human resources under DIS. DIS is now the single State agency overseeing the hiring for all of those aforementioned agencies. For this reason, Section 1 of the Bill proposes to allow DDS registry information to be made available to DIS, for the purposes of determining whether an applicant for 5 February 8, 2021 Ma/ta PUBLIC HEALTH COMMITTEE 9:00 a.m. PUBLIC HEARING employment with the- four human service agencies referenced above appears on the registry. For background, the DDS Abuse and Neglect Registry is a confidential, centralized database that contains the names of former employees of DDS and agencies and programs funded by DDS who have been terminated or separated from employment as a result of substantiated abuse or neglect. This administrative process is separate and distinct from any legal process in which a person could be charged or convicted of such abuse or neglect through the Criminal Justice System. After reviewing the drafted language of this section, DDS would like to respectfully request a technical amendment for the Committee's consideration for joint substitute language. An outline of our proposed technical amendment can be found in our written testimony submitted to the Committee. In Section 2, this section would allow the DDS Commissioner or DDS Regional or Training School Director to provide consent for necessary medical treatment of an emergency nature when the individual's legal representative is unavailable or unable to give such consent. Currently, DDS has the statutory authority to authorize necessary surgery for such person where, in the opinion of the person's attending physician, the surgery is of an emergency nature, and there is insufficient time to obtain the required written consent. There are circumstances, however, when an individual under the Department's care requires emergency treatment, other than emergency surgery, and there is insufficient time to obtain the required consent. In these situations, the Department is currently unable to grant consent for such emergency 6 February 8, 2021 Ma/ta PUBLIC HEALTH COMMITTEE 9:00 a.m. PUBLIC HEARING treatments. With advances in medical treatment that require less invasive treatments and surgery, DDS believes that allowing the Commissioner or his designees to consent to emergency medical treatment for an individual either when, a legal representative is not available to give consent, or the individual has no legal representative and the individual themselves is unable to give consent. This would allow that the individual with intellectual disability to have access to appropriate medical care while remaining independent and in the community. Section 3, Statute currently prohibits DDS from notifying and sharing any documents regarding a report of abuse or neglect that warrants an investigation when an individual's legal representative is the alleged perpetrator of such abuse or neglect, or the legal representative is residing with the alleged perpetrator. To ensure that the ongoing protection of individuals with intellectual disability and those individuals that are reporting suspected cases of abuse or neglect, this Section expands the Statute to prohibit DDS from sharing the original report of abuse or neglect and the evaluation report, also known as the Final Report, with a legal representative who has been found to be the substantiated perpetrator of abuse or neglect, or who is residing with a substantiated perpetrator. This provision would not restrict a court from allowing the substantiated perpetrator to have access to the report for purposes of illegal action. Section 4, this Section updates appointments to the Camp Harkness Advisory Committee to reflect changes to the names of the entities appointed and replaces certain appointed entities that have ceased to exist with criteria to appoint new members.