The Direct Support Professional Association of Minnesota (DSPAM) has become an important part in the fight for the professionalism and respect for direct support professionals. Since joining DSPAM 3 years ago, I have witnessed the growth and movement that this organization has done and how dedicated each person involved is to the direct care workers of Minnesota.
Over the last year DSPAM has pushed full force to be involved with advocacy, leadership, and taking care of direct support professionals. Our most proud and biggest accomplishment was our event held last September to pamper Minnesota DSPs and to allow them to have a day where the roles were reversed. Providing free haircuts and manicures, thanks to Spa Blu, over 200 DSPs attended receiving the pampering and care they so deserve. Through this event we were able to increase our membership to reach our first membership goal of 250. All of us are so thankful to our sponsors, donators, volunteers, and partners that helped make this event possible. Continue reading »
I am honored to have been elected president of the Direct Support Professional Association of Minnesota as of next year.
Being a part of DSPAM over the last two years has been an eye-opening, life-changing experience. I’ve had the opportunity to work with amazing people on the DSPAM board of directors, and I’ve watched DSPAM turn into an amazing organization, overcoming many milestones and accomplishing many of its goals.
I work as a direct support professional with developmentally disabled adults in residential settings. One thing I have in common with just about all my coworkers is that we need to work more than 40 hours a week to make ends meet – and even so, too many of us can’t afford our employers’ health care coverage.
With the recent cutbacks by our state (Minnesota), most of our residential programs have cut out overtime and cut down the number of full-time positions, reducing the number of positions that receive health insurance and paid time off. That means nearly all of us have to work two to three jobs to make ends meet. Chances are, we don’t get enough hours from any one of them to qualify for health insurance. That’s a difficult, demoralizing way to live, especially for those of us who are dedicated to direct support work and have invested years of our lives in our careers. Continue reading »
Angel Saylor (R) with home care aide Kelvin Jefferson at a DCA focus group
The Direct Care Alliance’s signature program, the Voices Institute, is about to hold its second National Leadership Program. The week-long retreat is an intensive learning journey, and this year’s class is another remarkable group, which will surely join the pioneers from the VI inaugural class to leave its mark on the direct care worker movement. We are returning to the DeKoven Center, where the roots that were planted at the first Voices Institute National Leadership Program will again thrive.
This year, we are welcoming men and women who care for people of all ages in a variety of settings, including nursing homes, hospice, group homes, day programs, assisted living, and home- and community-based programs. Consistent with the DCA’s objectives to build a broadly inclusive movement of empowered direct care workers, the class of 2009 represents a wide spectrum of direct care workers. Continue reading »
As every direct care worker advocate knows, personal and home care aides earn far too little for the important work they do. And now an updated version of PHI’s State Chart Book on Wages for Personal and Home Care Aides (PDF) gives advocates a valuable tool, proving that real wages are actually getting worse.
The chart book analyzes data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, adjusting last year’s wages for inflation to see how their earning power compares to average wages in 1999.
Nationwide, these inflation-adjusted rates, which the chartbook calls “real wages,” have decreased by 3 percent over the past nine years, dropping from $7.50 an hour to just $7.31. Real wages increased in more than half the states during that period, but not enough to make up for their decline in the other 21.
Median wages in 2008 ranged from $7.05 an hour in Texas to $12.55 in Alaska in 2008, or real wages of $5.61 to $9.90. “Wages for personal and home care aides are so low,” says PHI Director of Policy Research Dorie Seavey, “that about 20 percent of these workers received a raise on July 24 when the minimum wage increased to $7.25/hour.”
The chartbook also compares wages to federal poverty level wages for a one-person household.
Elise Nakhnikian
Communications Director
Direct Care Alliance
You know how usually you get a sponsor and then create an event? Well, we created an event and then got the sponsor.
On September 13, DSPAM (Direct Support Professional Association of Minnesota) is commemorating National Direct Support Professional Recognition Week with a special day for direct support professionals (DSPs). That’s the term NADSP uses for the personal care assistants, personal attendants, in-home support workers, and other direct care workers who provide support for people with disabilities.
We started out planning to just having a picnic. Then the DCA gave DSPAM some incentive money to seed a grassroots fundraising effort, and we started to think bigger. Our idea grew into Making Changes Together (PDF), which is a full-fledged event with catered picnic food, beverages, door prizes, games for the kids, and entertainment – all free for direct support workers and their friends and families. We’ll also have free haircuts, mani-pedis, makeovers, and massages, because DSPs work so much and we wanted to do something for them. And we’ll be giving out the DSP Choice Awards (PDF) to honor five outstanding direct support workers. Continue reading »
A full set of DCA Direct Care Fact Sheets, one for each of the 50 states and the District of Columbia, is now available in the Resources section of our website.
The one-page sheets were created as a resource for direct care worker advocates and their allies, legislators, policymakers, members of the media, and others interested in direct care issues. They include key facts such as:
The number of home health aides, nursing assistants, and personal and home care aides in the state in 2006 and the projected numbers of each in 2016
The average hourly wage for the state’s direct care workers
What percentage of direct care workers in that state or region are without health insurance
Elise Nakhnikian
Communications Director
Direct Care Alliance
“Bridget Siljander calls them the ‘invisible workforce.’ Without them, though, the fallout will be starkly clear,” begins a story that ran last week in the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune, one of the biggest papers in my state.
The advocacy work that led to my being quoted was fueled by my participation in the Voices Institute National Leadership Program, so it seemed appropriate that I was en route to New York City to meet with the rest of the program’s training team when I received a call from the Star Tribune’s Gail Rosenblum. She was writing a story about the personal care attendance program, and when she told two of Minnesota’s strongest advocates for people with disabilities – Anne Henry of the Minnesota Disability Law Center and Anni Simons of The Arc of Minnesota — that she wanted to talk to a personal care attendant, they sent her to me.
I was more than happy to share the positive side of personal care work, a profession that has been denigrated in recent months in my state of Minnesota. I told Gail that the contribution of personal care attendants to society is tremendous, and she clearly understood what I and the others she had talked to were saying. Her article provided a balance to very negative press for personal care attendants that has run rampant this year.
Bridget Siljander (right) at rally with DSPAM V-P Lindsay Short and Bridget's daughter, Imani (in red scarves).
From a fresh, wide-eyed neophyte to a rallying, testifying advocate – this is the magic of the Direct Care Alliance touch in the direct care worker advocacy movement.
When I blogged about the beginning of my journey as an advocate I told you: “Now, let me show what I can do!” Well, let me show you even more! Even I can hardly believe what I’ve been up to for the last month or so: testifying, meetings with legislators, and attending a huge rally.
On February 17, I testified before the Minnesota Senate Committee Health and Human Services Budget Division about budget cuts to disability and personal care attendant services recommended by the Governor. I signed up because it was a great advocacy opportunity: with PCA wages as low as they already are, we can’t afford further cuts.
After getting confirmation from the committee page that I was on the agenda to testify, I began my research. I consulted with numerous allies and more experienced advocates. I read the pieces in the Governor’s proposal that addressed Personal Care Assistance Services. Some members of the board of my association (I’m the president of the Direct Support Professional Association of Minnesota, or DSPAM) sent me documents to read in preparation, such as responses to the proposal from people with disabilities.
As I testified, I wondered if the committee had yet seen the legislative letter that DSPAM had just sent to all Minnesota legislators. DSPAM would soon follow up on the letter with visits to the state capitol.
Bridget Siljander, the president of the Direct Support Professional Association of Minnesota and one of the DCA’s Direct Care Worker Specialists, testified last month before the Health and Human Services Budget Division of the Minnesota Senate Finance Committee. She urged the committee not to cut the budget for the state’s personal care assistance program.
A full set of 
