Inmate-to-nursing-home idea irks some advocates for elderly

CLEVELAND (AP) — Some advocates for the elderly in Ohio are upset with a legislative proposal that could save $15 million a year by moving the state’s sickest inmates to a nursing home.

John Saulitis, an ombudsman with an Area Agency on Aging office in Youngstown, worried that the proposal doesn’t require notification of relatives that inmates might be housed with their loved ones.

However, state Sen. Thomas Patton, a Strongsville Republican, said Thursday the measure he has sponsored would not put sick inmates alongside the law-abiding elderly. Ailing criminals would be placed in a single privately run nursing home set aside for them, he said.

Patton thinks 110 of Ohio’s 51,000 inmates are sick enough to qualify for transfer to nursing homes. The state prison system thinks the number is more like 20 to 30.

Patton said it was never his intent to move inmates into nursing homes. He said he would update his proposal if it reaches the Senate floor.

A question of how to pay for the inmates’ health care also has emerged. Under the plan, incapacitated inmates expected to live six months or less could be medically paroled to the designated nursing home.

Because they would be considered parolees, Patton said the bulk of their medical expenses could shift from the state to the federal government through Medicaid, the government health-care program for the poor.