Sohn: Orange Grove caretakers need state raise

Donna Cox, right, receives assistance from Deloras Hudgins during an eye/hand coordination exercise at Orange Grove in a day program called Adult Comprehensive Training.
Donna Cox, right, receives assistance from Deloras Hudgins during an eye/hand coordination exercise at Orange Grove in a day program called Adult Comprehensive Training.

Wal-Mart workers in the Chattanooga area got a raise this week. The average full-time hourly worker now makes $13.38 an hour, and the average part-time wage is $10.58 an hour, according to news reports.

But not so for the some 20,000 front-line workers in Tennessee who help care for our residents with intellectual and developmental disabilities in facilities like Chattanooga's Orange Grove. These key caregivers help the state's most vulnerable citizens and their families, yet many of them haven't had a raise in years because 90 percent of funding for operations like Orange Grove comes from state and federal sources, like TennCare.

Across the state, more than 8,000 people with intellectual and developmental disabilities rely on this network of about 20,000 workers. The state has another 6,000 people with intellectual and developmental disabilities on a waiting list for care. Yet the typical direct service worker pay rate in this field is $8.61 an hour. That makes it easy to see why the turnover rate in this very critical safety net is higher than 45 percent.

Orange Grove Executive Director Kyle Hauth and officials of similar nonprofit organizations are talking to state lawmakers this month in hopes of getting an additional $20 million commitment from the state's new budget to provide a $1 an hour rate increase for these workers.

Hauth said the state's budget does give state workers a 4 percent raise, but includes no increases for the workers at partner groups like Orange Grove that provide the bulk of state disabilities care. In fact, over the past decade state raises for direct service providers increased only 1.9 percent, compared to 16 percent for state employees.

At Orange Grove, which serves about 1,000 clients, most of these critical caretakers make between minimum wage and $10 an hour, and many work second and third jobs. Hauth said they continue to work at Orange Grove because helping people with disabilities is a passion or calling.

This year, the state has revenues that top its anticipated expenses. But of course everyone and every group is angling for some of that extra money.

We believe some of it should be allocated toward these meager raises for those who care for our most vulnerable citizens.

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