By Gema G. Hernández, former Secretary Florida Department of Elder Affair

Every ten years the White House Conference on Aging takes place in Washington and every ten years the leaders and advocates for elders get a chance to get together and express their opinions on major issues impacting not only this generation of elders, but the next generation to come. While previous White House Conferences on Aging have been able to impact the national agenda, this year’s conference outcomes and recommendations will be buried in a thousand page report with no further value to the administration or they will be distorted to accommodate the administration’s plan. Why, may we ask, will this year be so different than others?

The answer is very simple. There is a serious dichotomy between what the Republican administration wants to happen, and what most of the delegates recommend should happen. This is particularly intriguing because the bulk of the delegates were hand picked by Republican governors, Republican members of Congress and a Republican controlled Administration on Aging. It is not a secret that the Administration on Aging’s main objective was and still is give to the White House a clear mandate to privatize Social Security, Reform Medicaid and place more financial burden on family caregivers under the umbrella of personal responsibility.

The results indicate the Administration on Aging failed short of its objective. Even though they tried to minimize the strong opinion of the participants regarding their opposition to the President’s privatization program for Social Security or the delegates’ strong support to financially strengthen Medicare and Medicaid, they were still in direct contradiction to the administration’s position to “reform and cut” both programs.

Even though Social Security was such an important issue it did not make it to the top ten priority issues, this was ranked #11 as priority when in reality it was #1 in interest, generating a true emotional debate. The same thing happened to Medicare. The strong support of the delegates to “financially” strengthen Medicare became less financial in nature and more supportive in principle as the administration “modified” the recommendation. On the other hand, the administration scored a major victory by recommending that Medicare be the primary payor of health care for workers 65 and older, not their businesses or employers. This is a great win for corporate America which has been trying to cut health care costs and eliminate pension plans.

While it was very much present in everyone’s mind that Managed Care may eventually absorb all the dollars going to the Older Americans Act, no panel dealt with that issue. In addition, no panel fully explored the unintended consequences of merging programs and services for elders with programs and services for disabled adults. It was curious to notice that references about the Aging Resource Centers omitted the word Disability from the discussion. In reality the grants that funded the creation of such centers, called the centers Aging and Disability Resource Center and indicated that these centers were going to be the entrance point to the entire synchronization of both programs. During the conference this issue was not fully explored.

Also during the conference no time was given to explore what role if any the Area Agencies on Aging will play if all the elders in need of services become members of Managed Care Organizations. Could the AAA be reduced to an information center only? If this is the case what will happen to the million of dollars they control? What happened with the issue of re importation of Canadian drugs?

Managed Care Organizations are positioning themselves to absorb and integrate all the activities within the continuum of care under their control, from the education, prevention, transportation, meals to care management, home health and long term care. This is such an important topic that should have been at the center of the discourse.

To make sure the opinions and recommendations do not become a mandate, republican members of congress are saving the day by publically telling the media the recommendations have no bearing or influence in what Congress will decide to do next. On the other hand, you hear what you want to hear and in Florida, Secretary Green intends to organize a grass roots movement to implement the recommendations of the conference. If she hears the same thing the rest of the delegates heard, her grass roots movement will be organized to stop the privatization of Social Security, to stop cuts to the Medicaid program and to financially strengthen Medicare. But of course, spin doctors are already making sure that the non acceptable recommendations are watered down, so much watered down that we may not recognize the final report.