Dr. Rytter wants to be transparent about how she pays her support staff, because it is an unusual circumstance due to COVID. Highlighting the important information makes this explanation kind of long. We thank you in advance for reading this all.
There’s something called a public health emergency due to COVID, and it is nationwide. The public health emergency allows people to keep their Medicaid regardless of whether they might no longer meet all of the requirements. The public health emergency gets renewed every ninety days depending on how bad COVID is. We believe that it has always been renewed throughout the entire pandemic – even in April 2022 when some officials said we were in an endemic. With the prediction of another bad COVID surge occurring in the fall and winter, we feel confident that the public health emergency will be reissued in 2023.
What does this have to do with Dr. Rytter and paying her staff in Washington State?
One of Colorado’s Medicaid requirements is to meet with one’s case manager in person once a year. The public health emergency has people like Dr. Rytter exempted from having this annual meeting with the case manager. In other words, the public health emergency has made it so that she can forgo the face-to-face meeting that occurs early March and she can stay in Washington State while receiving Colorado Medicaid. One of the things that her Medicaid pays for is staff to assist her physical needs, like meals and housework.
Dr. Rytter’s case manager assessed what her physical needs are and then calculated a monthly budget with which she can pay her staff. It is Dr. Rytter’s job to make sure that she has enough staff to meet all of her physical needs while staying within her monthly staffing budget. We assure you that this is a nerve-wracking balance. Dr. Rytter bases the different pay rates on how much work the different shifts require. This is the fairest way to do this. Also, the lowest paying shifts enable people to have another job. For example, the overnight staff can mostly sleep.
Another noteworthy thing is that Colorado gives Dr. Rytter the authority to decide how to train her staff. She offers paid hands-on training where experienced employees walk a newer staff through the job duties. No classroom instruction is required with Colorado Medicaid.
Dr. Rytter has a governmental approved payroll agency called Palco. Palco takes out the necessary taxes and social security out of each paycheck. Palco also provides worker’s compensation and paid sick leave.
When someone accepts Dr. Rytter’s job offer, she gives them Palco’s enrollment paperwork to complete and submit to Palco through either email or snail mail. Before someone can start training with experienced staff, Palco needs to process their paperwork and approve them to work. She already had three people undergo this hiring process, and everything has been fine.