CHARLESTON, W.Va. –The Birth to Three program hasn’t seen a rate increase for their practitioners in two decades and a bill that could give them that raise has stalled in the house, where it’s likely to stay.
Senate Bill 707 aims to give the practitioners, who provide in-home services to children three and under, a 25% rate increase. The bill passed the senate on March 29 with a unanimous vote. The bill is now sitting in the House Finance Committee and Monday committee chair Vernon Criss said that he wouldn’t be taking the bill up.
The program, which serves all 55 counties, provides services over eight different areas, including physical therapy, occupational therapy, developmental, dietitian, social work, service coordination, and developmental specialist services.
Cindy Chamberlin, who is a physical therapist that serves Nicholas, Raleigh and Fayette counties said the program hasn’t seen a raise since April 1, 2003.
She says this causes discrepancies between their job and those who are newly graduated from school.
“I made about a third of the money that a new grad can make going into a hospital and that’s a huge problem, because new grads are coming out of school with about $140,000 dollars in debt if there a physical therapist, and we don’t get loan forgiveness, even though we live in a rural state, we don’t get loan forgiveness because we’re not state employees,” Chamberlin said on MetroNews Talkline Wednesday morning.
The 900 independent practioners with the program, provide services to more than 7,000 kids.
Chamberlin said that the rate increase would help retain individuals for this type of work.
“I want to be able to empower and educate somebody else and share the skills that I’ve learned over the last 25 years and pass that on to them, so when they come into our program, they have a better idea of what to expect,” she said.
She says that this program is vital for West Virginia because of the services that they provide. She also referenced a study from Arizona that states if you invest one dollar into early intervention while they are kids, then it will save $16 dollars later in medical, education and the judicial.
She said that these are the reasons that they are making themselves known at the capitol during the legislative session.
“It’s frustrating, which is why we’ve had such a presence here at the capitol just to really talk about how important early intervention is, how important what we do is,” Chamberlin said. “Because we will be essentially saving money for our state by investing in our future which is our children.”
Another piece of legislation that would impact the program but in a good way would be House Bill 3365, which would appropriate funds to them because according to Chamberlin they ran out of funds in March for the current fiscal year.
“That will bridge the gap or give us enough funding to get us to the end of our fiscal year on June 30, 2025,” Chamberlin said.
She said that they normally have enough money until the end of May, however they continue to serve more kids. In 2003, they served 2.4% of kids and now they serve 13%.
The legislative session ends on April 12th.
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