Senate and House Republicans announced an agreement with Senate and House Democrats today that will bring nursing homes the much-needed assistance they lacked from the Human Services Budget bill and pass a statewide, infrastructure-focused bonding bill before session ends on May 22 at midnight. House Minority Leader Lisa Demuth and Senate Minority Leader Mark Johnson released the following statement:

“All session long we heard the calls to return the surplus back to the taxpayers, but at the end of the day, Democrats were just not willing to give the surplus back.

“Last night, after seeing the dismal Human Services budget that will force more nursing homes to close and make families scramble to find care for their loved ones, we secured up to $300 million in funding to our nursing homes and an infrastructure-focused General Obligation Bonding bill in order to end this session. After signing the agreement, we are now working out the details for nursing home funding that will help them continue to provide amazing care for our seniors and vulnerable loved ones, while we select projects in the GO bonding bill that will mainly prioritize wastewater, roads and bridges.

“It is shameful that it took to the end of session for Democrats to be willing to discuss funding our nursing homes. They have a $72 billion budget, and yet they originally couldn’t even find a couple hundred million for nursing homes. It took Republicans fighting tooth and nail to get this funding to save our nursing homes. Playing politics with the lives of seniors is immoral and shouldn’t have got to this point.

“Taxpayers deserve better than this, but it is simply the best we could do as the Democrats abandoned moderation this session and moved full-steam ahead with their agenda without regard to the long-term impact to the state.”