State Agencies & Govt'l Affairs-Senate and House
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- October 2, 2026
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:09:49
certificate listed as manner of death as homicide and as cause of death as physiologic stress associated with struggle and prone restraint and again for the benefit of the committee physiologic stress is a prohibited form of torture by international law in the Geneva convention just to kind of establish a baseline something else that was said or was unknown we heard from from
different individuals at the table here that it was five individuals who were charged and thank you missmcdonald you corrected the record and said that it was6 and how many individuals were fired wass it 12 or was it 13? ok because we've heard both of those as well and so this causes challenges for those of us sitting at the table to know whether we're getting the full truthful or accurate information from this case and looking at the report that you provided us
I see that that's just over 10.5% of of what would be your labor force those positions are currently unfilled so in the eight months since this event took place in September have you dramatically changed policies on quality and quantity of hiring so that incidents like this don't happen again.
Speaker 27
1:11:17
we've had some pretty extensive conversations that
many of y'all have been involved with around hiring and retaining staff at the human development centers and the the use of on the high utilization of oncall contracts. So I think I saw representative painter in here earlier about some of those conversations around how we're hitting those contracts right now because we're not we we don't have his as many FTEs as we need to not hit those contracts. so in short yes we are having extensive
conversations around what that looks like we have drafted a a plan we have we're in the internal approval process es around that plan, um, currently and we hope to be able to publicly make that plan available so we're at
Chair
Unverified
1:12:11
8 months since that happened a little
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:12:14
over 8 months. so how much longer until the discussions and the draftings and all those things are made available
Chair
Unverified
1:12:28
it's I I can't I'm not gonna promise you a date that I can't keep where we're a working actively internally on approvals. a year from now will we know surely it would not take that long. I just don't want to give you an arbitrary date and give you say two weeks and I can't promise that
Speaker 133
1:12:48
cause I'm not sure but we're actively working on internal approvals on this retention and recruitment plan follow up
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:12:58
so the one thing I have heard definitively is that we have instituted contracts and hired consultants is that
Speaker 126
1:13:07
correct? we have utilized contracts for many
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:13:11
years'm talking about this since this incident we have employed consultants so we don't we don't with the help of these consultants we don't have a definitive timeline yet of when a public plan will be available or when conversations will move but we
are paying consultants we are doing that for this
Speaker 157
1:13:34
specific thing correct the consult so I think we're getting two things conflated the consultants are in here to
Chair
Unverified
1:13:41
to analyze the the horrible event that happened at warren do this analysis for us work on all of our policies and greatly improve the care at that particular facility that we then hope to spread to the other four. The HDC recruitment retention plan, although related on I mean
obviously is a plan for all of the centers to understand better you know what why we are not why we are continuing to have issues keeping hiring and keeping staff and why we are hitting the on call contracts so heavily so the plan that I'm talking about is the plan that would be a recruitment plan for all five. not not in particular to what
Speaker 27
1:14:22
has gone on at warren nor what the consultants are looking at. I think I follow some if if
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:14:29
not most of that and me not
following the rest is probably my fault not yours but what I will say just to to conclude is that we are 8 months later and it does sound like there's a lot of talk and maybe ideas but there's nothing actionable in terms of making sure employees like this are not hired again making sure we're not 1011% understaffed it's it's just up in the air at this at this time and there's no definitive timeline of when you're going to have decided to improve it officially.
Chair
Unverified
1:15:02
is that correct I'm gonna ask director rise to give you more comprehensive documents on where we are with the consultant I think it's coming across like a lot of talk with there has been a lot of work completed the last 8 months that is actionable and in place right now I think one of the things to be frank that we are seeing is when they're looking at stuff then they're turning over the rock and then there's something else and does that makes sense? so what we're
Speaker 157
1:15:32
doing what they came in to help us look at you know we continued to then go well we need to look at this issue now, right? So but I don't want
Chair
Unverified
1:15:43
it to appear that DdS and the hasn't they have are not making significant progress we have comprehensive updates from the consultant showing
Speaker 27
1:15:50
what they have done that we can provide you thank you p re s ent ative beatty you're
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:15:56
recognized thank you Mr chairir. I kind of
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
1:16:04
want to go back. I know, you know, just from
doing a couple of searches there was like 148 page investigative report, based on the the events and we've heard what happened and and kind of looking through some of those that you and you mentioned here a ban on prone restraints and that's face down holding someone face down on the ground forth3 minutes until they're not breathing so we're not gonna do that anymore actually prerestraint protocol training, you know, try
to de escalate it's kind of what I've been doing to myself over here a little bit and then chemical restraint review and oversight of when you can use that it also pointed out vital sign monitoring that we're going to include that in some of the training and then administrative overhaul policy monitoring that now that's required and then a systemwide application outside of what I just identified through the review of this consultant that's coming in to to to make a plan
and and most of the time you know, the consultants come in when they find a problem they're reporting it to you can you report to us any other changes or rules or implementations that you made systemically through through all five of the HdCs based on the results and information from the consultant because we don't wait until we get a final report I hope to implement these changes because they could be life changing changes so could you update us on something other than what you know, came out of the long
term care report that that y'all have implemented to make these these facilities safer and and a
Speaker 22
1:17:48
better provide for our Kansans so speaking about warren specifically the consultants have brought in nursing, they brought in behavioral specialist, we have a team they're just fantastic with a ton of experience in working with Idd and they've been at warren almost every week helping
do training, helping doing reviews of our personcented plans as well as our behavior support plans and then rewriting them and so working very closely with our behavioral health and psychology staff to update those plans to make them more plain language to make them very personsific with actionable items so that the layperson ac andA can implement those actions and steps for that specific
person's behavioral healthha needs we are super excited about their interventions and reducing the use of restraints and very much look forward to implementing the things that they're working with right now across all five HDcs I think and I understand where you're comingpresentative beatty but we're still in the thick of it and getting everything where it needs to be at warren and then we are 100% going to start translating those things
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
1:19:12
and activities and policies across all five. so just a a follow up
to make certain that I understood what you just said is right now the focus is just on warren because that's where we had the death so all the focus is there and if if there's information gleaned and they're there are things that we could change we're gonna implement that later at these other4 HdCs are are as as these areas are identified are you implementing change
systemically through all5hCCs we are
Speaker 22
1:19:46
sharing that information 100%. for example, one of the things is they inter they introduced a new version of the the personcentered service plan and so we've been sharing that with other HdCs butpresentative beatty you want to share like our other Hds HDcs were on constantly doing trainings retrainings the office of Longerm Care comes in regularly. we're they're they're all actively
Speaker 53
1:20:14
doing things to prevent this from ever
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
1:20:17
happening. I I understand that my my question is have you have you seen anything or they identified anything that it is something that I don't sharing is one thing but mandating that this is the practice and procedure that you're gonna follow at these HdCs to prevent a death or or other injury have you have you gained any of that information and have you implemented that not just share it but to mandate it by policy, procedure, memo operating procedures have you
done anything with that? Are you waiting
Chair
Unverified
1:20:50
on this consultant's final report Represent a pa in the updates that Jennifer's been keeping me on this particular facility was not on par with the rest of them. and so what what they're having to do is I mean they're in their I mean redirecting how they're doing med passes. it's they had policies that weren't
right that that they should have been updated they hadha plans that were not specific to people that were completely against how we train them to do it we have asked the other HCCs to pull and ensure that they're not doing the same failed practices at this point though I mean it's really isolated what we're finding so far of the just at that facility because the
other ones what what they're finding that's happening there is not happening at the other one so at you know like it's not a a shared practice where we go this is a great idea go call conway because they need to do this too that's
Speaker 157
1:22:00
not what we're seeing we're seeing that they were not following with the other four have have been following and we're
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
1:22:07
just trying to get warren to there so that that
takes me back to the first question I asked y'all. is who's responsible for oversight and looking after these HdCs if you had warren not
following the rules and procedures that you've identified whose job was
it to identify that they're not and to make certain that we don't have a death down there. I mean who
who's who ultimately was the the final word in that that should have been looking at these sites So
Speaker 224
1:22:37
the first line of defense who's in charge of that is the
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
1:22:41
superintendent atm not asking first line of defense I'm talking about from that staff position up
to the high rank at at DHS who is ultimately responsible that these folks are following procedures if the superintendent's not doing it who at DHS knows they're not following the procedures who knows that
Chair
Unverified
1:23:01
they're not handing the meds out properly dude I mean there's an assistant director underneathrector rise that is the liaison to thehdCs at the same time that the superintendent was let go that person retired
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
1:23:22
it last question have y'all taken the training classes? have you taken the restraint and the training classes
Speaker 157
1:23:30
that these HdCs take. I took restraint training at yeah atbooneville but it was in 2015. maybe maybe
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
1:23:36
that's a good place to start with taking this training that your folks are taking to see if it's sufficient that they understand that holding somebody that face down for 13 minutes is unacceptable. did
Speaker 30
1:23:47
go through the training just sharing that
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
1:23:50
so and and then have you made visits to all fivehdCs since the death sir and warren me
Allison Guthrie
Unverified
1:23:58
and my team we are regularly having contact and visiting the HTCs in person. thank you all again
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
1:24:06
it's apologize for getting riled up, but I mean we're talking about human life and if we're waiting on a study to implement changes that's unacceptable. thank y'all
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
1:24:23
Senator Clark Tucker you're recognized thank you Mr chairir I want to join my colleagues and offer my condolences to the family and we've had a lot of conversation here today about what changes can be made at the agency level, you know, moving forward and and rightly so. My question is really a follow up to a pointpresentative Mayberry was making earlier. what do you need out of the legislature to make sure that we can avoid tragedies like this from occurring in the future.
Cause I can assure you we want to make sure we want to do our part to make sure that we
Speaker 10
1:25:14
prevent tragedies like this from occurring. Thank youenator Tucker.
Chair
Unverified
1:25:19
you know we always appreciate it when members of the legislature take an interest in any of our facilities.
and I know I think some of y'all have recently been to the state hospital, right? so we just we appreciate you try
Speaker 27
1:25:36
giving us grace and understanding what we're trying to do and then supporting those efforts in in multiple arenas right in these spaces so I would
Chair
Unverified
1:25:45
say that that is that would be our request I think the other is is that many times we do have to hit contracts we've always had to to maintain not always I hate
Speaker 27
1:25:58
saying that word we have for many years even beforeOVID I had to utilize some contracts to make ratio it's it's going to take time to to shift that over because that's been a
Chair
Unverified
1:26:12
that's been a long standing practice. and so I think just if we could just give us some kindness around the process
Speaker 27
1:26:19
knowing that we are working on that as you continue your review of
Senator Clarke Tucker
Unverified
1:26:30
this process if if you think there are laws that would help
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:26:39
or specific funding measures I I hope you'll
Senator Kim Hammer
Unverified
1:26:41
let us know you Senator hammer you're recognized thank you of the of the 13 that were fired who was at the highest level of being
Speaker 74
1:26:51
fired not the name but the title. The superintendent of that facility the nursing
Senator Kim Hammer
Unverified
1:26:56
home administrator and fired or retired did that
misunderstand something a while ago fired OK. and all 13 of them were fired. none of them were given the
option to retire. is that correct sir OK. and then on the go back to the area that's in question, you know you could pay50,60,70 1000 dollars
in some areas but that's not going to put the bodies in a geographical area in order to meet the needs the consultants
and part of their job is that to do an assessment of just that facility or all facilities and maybe you already have that information available as far as the manpower shortage in the area where the facilities are located is that speak to that for just a second. please
Allison Guthrie
Unverified
1:27:52
so the Columbus group came in specifically for warren and for this incident and directed plan of correction how does that help you go
Senator Kim Hammer
Unverified
1:28:00
ahead. you want to add to it
Allison Guthrie
Unverified
1:28:08
so they're not there to evaluate our staffing levels or the community staffing levels.
Senator Kim Hammer
Unverified
1:28:13
but do you have that somewhere in any of the reports that you have done or is that something that needs to be done because I understand the floating concept but a floating concept is a temporary fix to a long term problem? Is that a fair statement? sir so do you have a report out there are you working on a report that shows in the
geographical location where these facilities are the ability to staff appropriately and sufficiently so as to help prevent this from happening if staffing is an issue is I think has been stated here
Chair
Unverified
1:28:56
so I think I briefly mentioned that I think topresentativeRose so we have we have drafted an overarching retention recruitment plans specifically for the human development centers it's not
broken down geographically because some of the issues I believe are very universal to all five that is the that's the plan that we're going through internal approvals on right now because I know and you
Senator Kim Hammer
Unverified
1:29:24
know separate issue is you you know we take a look at some of our prison facilities and they're having to bus employees in in order to be able to staff them and I've I've just curious as to whether or not that is done and if that that is being done
how are you going to channel that up to us as a legislative body so we can have an opportunity to look at that you're gonna send it to state agencies or when will that be done to where we can take a look
Speaker 165
1:29:57
at that and maybe that goes back to that question a year senatorhammer, I think
Senator Kim Hammer
Unverified
1:30:01
that that report will go to Alc and and you anticipate so is that report then in the works or when would when
Speaker 165
1:30:07
would you expect that think that that's whatres representative rose was was inquiring about and you hope
Senator Kim Hammer
Unverified
1:30:12
it's not going to be a year it'd be sooner than a year right?retty sure it won't be a year. yes sir. OK with
regards to the rate study that was mentioned a while ago last question Mr chairir regarding the rate study that was mentioned a while ago refresh my memory the rate study is that is that completed or it's about to be completed refresh my memory when that's done or not just
Speaker 224
1:30:38
to clarify so this is the this is the right study that was
Chair
Unverified
1:30:45
a piece of legislation went through remember and it's for specific services under the past program so Idd and behavioral health and we are working to implement it January 1. january 1 of 27? Yes sir
Senator Kim Hammer
Unverified
1:31:03
OK. so will that rate study
that was that the the numbers at that rate study produced and is that going to address the
areas that have been problematic in this situation is is that rate study specific to like thec andA's and
Chair
Unverified
1:31:25
the all those folks are not no unrelated so that rate study is for providers that provide like in for the dd providers that provide supportive living so people who were on the waiver getting that service in their home supportive living that that rate is in this rate
study a lot of in home and schoolbas behavioral health services are in this rate study but it's not it's not like clinical like we're not going
Speaker 233
1:31:53
in and saying CA's need to be paid this or it's not that kind of right study it's for those specific services under the past program. OK and and just refresh my memory I'm sorry
Senator Kim Hammer
Unverified
1:32:05
that it might not be as good as it needs to be but with regards to what the C andA's need to be paid and where they are and where they need to be gotten to what do we have that that shows what that number is
whether you have the study out there or is that part of
Speaker 10
1:32:22
a rate study somewhere or what no sir so that was part their state employees at thehCCs of course so that
Chair
Unverified
1:32:27
was part of the pay plan that went into effect last summer that now we pay them what did you say3 no right right so
Senator Kim Hammer
Unverified
1:32:34
that is the rate that we should be paying them in order to be able to recruit them so we're back to the question of do you have the people in the area to recruit if that is the market fair market rate that we should be paying is that correct?
Chair
Unverified
1:32:50
and that'sir that's a very fair question. I will say that we see a great discrepancy in the amount ofc andA's applying for a job in conway versus the amount ofc andAs applying for them jobs in the other areas conway we're getting so many applicants because of where it's located located right thank you
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:33:12
Representative DavidRay you're recognized thank you Mr.
Representative David Ray
Unverified
1:33:15
Chairman first of all everything that has been
said extending sympathy and condolences to the family. I echo that and also echo what Senator Tucker said a moment ago about if there are things that the legislature could assist with to help prevent a tragedy like this in the future please let us know there is one thing that you said a moment ago, Miss Weatherton that caught my attention and it was you made a remark about the standard at this facility in Warren not being up to the standard at the
other four centers and you know I know when when you have a high profile tragedy you know whether it's 911 or the the airplane collision at Reagan National Airport last year or anything like that Once an investigation's been done there's usually in in hindsight we can usually find warning signs that in a perfect world would have been recognized and addressed sooner
were there warning signs at this center I'm curious how you came to the conclusion that the standard was not up to the other four centers and were there warning signs that maybe were missed thank you for the question Representative ray. I
Speaker 27
1:34:46
think the consultants have very much showed us that the standard when they went in for the deep dive
that the standards were not what what was expected nor at the other four centers and I understand what you're saying. on on if there weren't warning signs why weren't
Chair
Unverified
1:35:05
there warning signs? I mentioned earlier and I just I hate to get into personnel stuff open like like this but I will be happy to talk to y'all but again changing out the superintendent and then and then changing the person that was the representative in the central office that was the sole
responsibility was to oversee these facilities and go out there and check this sort of thing has also changed guard and I agree with you.
Speaker 27
1:35:36
if it's not it's the superintendent then it's this
Chair
Unverified
1:35:41
then it's this other pos this assistant director that reports directly to Jennifer whose job is to ensure that those superintendents and those facilities are maintaining the standards that are expected and
so and then that assistant reports up to Jennifer. So, changing both of those positions I think we will see a different outcome the person that we are that is going to be permanent at warren has been there as interim but she has a she's a long standing superintendent for us
Speaker 27
1:36:19
from Arkadelphia who lives in warren and has been commuting to
Arkadelphia for us for years and she's a strong woman and she's cleaning house
Chair
Unverified
1:36:32
and one of the reasons where we're also seeing problems with hiring and warren is because she has a very different standard of who she wants working for her and so we are experiencing very high turnover at that facility. since she has been there the past 8 months. So but I agree with you we should have seen warning signs if the facility was not
Speaker 27
1:36:57
performing to the expectations thank you
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:37:03
want to follow up on that just quickly. So with regard to warning signs is there
an independent or outside agency that audits these facilities and if so who is that yes sir so the
Speaker 27
1:37:17
office of long term carere goes into these facilities and audits them they're there regularly so with regard to the warren facility
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:37:30
what did you know about the audits that long term care had performed about the warren facility prior to this event
Speaker 112
1:37:40
happening we had we we are privy to every
Speaker 27
1:37:43
on site survey that they do at all facilities we get copies of all of those documents there was nothing of this caliber or related to these kind of failed practices leading up to this event I understand that there may not
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:38:01
there may never have been an event like this but just because there's never been an event like it doesn't mean that there aren't things to look for that would indicate that an event like this would be possible or might be more probable based on say employee evaluations performance evaluations of the employees that didn't go well or I mean you I think in as you said in response to Representative ray you knew the warren facility was underperforming or was it
worse essentially than the other facilities something led you to that conclusion but was
Chair
Unverified
1:38:36
no that's that that's not what I said I said that the consultant group has when they came in after that after the death we identified the deficiencies that were occurring at that facility. That was what I was trying to expresspresentativeRay there were not warning signs that went up that went up the chain of command between the the superintendent, the assistant
director Jennifer and then to me those warning signs did not flow up so but for the fact that this occurred in the consultant came in is when we've uncovered deficient practices so the consultant clearly
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:39:14
identified them after the fact do you think the office of long term care is not doing their job very well? no sir this this
Speaker 181
1:39:22
is the sole responsibility of the division of developmental
Speaker 27
1:39:25
disability services. This is the opposite and ultimately that comes up through me so I'm not trying to throw her under the bus my point
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:39:34
is why would they not have found if the office of long term care does these audits and they're thorough why would they not have found the same deficiencies that the consultants seemed
to very easily find after the fact
Chair
Unverified
1:39:48
the office of Longerm Care is not charged with coming out and pulling individual client files and saying why in the world do all yourha plans look exactly alike right so what happens is there's a portable event it gets reported, it gets keyed they send nurses out to do the survey
they're looking at that right? so this is more of a a program policy review that would be under the purview ofddS they're coming out to look at incidents, accidents, complaints not widespread, you know you you have a policy and your policy is not
Speaker 112
1:40:20
good office of long term care is doing this more generalized
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:40:23
would say they need more specific if there's an event then the office of long term care comes out I'm talking about like a yearly
audit similar to what the consultant ultimately did is there's someone who does that on a regular basis some
Speaker 250
1:40:47
entity now that's something that we need to look at
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:40:51
doing because those that might have identified the warning signs before an event like this ever happened right very good Representativeladyman you're recognized
Representative Jack Ladyman
Unverified
1:41:07
thank you Mr chairman and I'm not a member of this committee I appreciate you letting me ask a question on I'm try not to talk too long but I I I was not gonna ask a question but I have to this discussion and ma'am the mother of the young man that passed away uhm very sorry. you know it doesn't matter how perfect the system is there are failures
and I was gonna say I couldn't imagine how you feel but I can. because you know we had a couple we had a we had an individual that passed away in Jonesboro just a few a good friend of mine his son passed away there was nothing bad about that it was but I talked to the individuals that was there and how how they handled that and you know they
did everything right but that doesn't always happen. and you know I have a son in one of the facilities and this discussion has been very good a lot of people have left and they won't hear what I have to say but many people have asked what we can do to prevent this from happening at other facilities and I'm very interested in that since my son is in one of these other facilities and I know that these sites get
inspected more than once long term care there's another organization that does an inspection. My wifelinnda and I were on the committee that reviewed incidents in the Jonesboro facility and there are a lot of them a lot more this is a failure of the system but there are a lot of incidents that the system worked and it it prevented this kind of thing and you talk about what's the term restrain restraints well let me tell you you have to use restraints at times
I sit in my living room with my knee on my son's throat to keep him from hurting himself until the police got there and these individuals working at these sites they have to make quick decisions just like I did and it's difficult to remember your training but talking about the training it cost $2000 to train one CNA at an HDC you know how many were trained last year at the Jonesboro HDC400
400200 $0 there's a turnover there's a reason for that now we can say we're paying these people adequately and we are paying them based on the rate study what other states pay but this is a group of people that we are responsible to make sure that they're taking care of there are many things the questions have been asked what can we do as a legislative body I had two bills that died in committee during fiscal session Representative Lee has a
bill that's not been passed there are many other bills we have people working out of house trailers you know if you were working out of a house trailer and somebody offered you a better job in a nice office wouldn't you take that? that's why we have turnover I mean it's go to these places and look and you'll see what the problem is we had a bill and this is a question we had a procedure where we were paying individuals regionally
because we could not hire individuals in that area which means we were paying people in rural areas more than people in Jonesboro and Conway where we have plenty of people applying you just mentioned that that was taken away. I don't remember exactly how that happened but that particular program was helping us recruit people in those rural areas like Boonville and warren and Arkadelphia you know we're75% of our nurses are RNs in Arkadelphia or traveling nurses or they were I haven't
seen the latest numbers that means we're paying them way more than we are the current nurses because we can't hire nurses there we have to pay more in those areas to get people to move there and be our ins that's very simple solution we need to look in the mirror guys, people we need to look in the mirror we can't expect them to come to us and and and tell us what what our job is and what we need to do we need to be more familiar
we need to go to these sites if you don't understand and you don't want to vote for a bill that I have to get people out of a house trailer and into an office come to Jonesboro I'll show you I'll show you and there are other bills this needs to be a priority in our next session it does and these people do not have a lobbyist the state hospital is another one we don't have a a capital improvement fund for the HDCs or
the hospital we have it for schools we have it for prisons we don't have it we need to have a capital improvement account set up because if you improve the working conditions you get better people that follow the policies Mr chairman I'm sorry I'm talking so long but my question is that program I speak to I spoke about where we were paying individuals that was taken down, discontinued is that correct
Speaker 75
1:46:52
think you're talking about ship like a rural ship differential when when the new pay plan was
Chair
Unverified
1:47:00
implemented one of the goals behind it was to because the the pay was increasing pretty good you know that was to get rid of all these different differentials everybody is paying but but we have always been told that after letting the pay plan settle for a second if we need to come back
and request such a thing that it would be considered so that is something that we are talking about in our retention recruitment plan. it's sure that we have the the funding to do such a
Speaker 27
1:47:36
thing and then if and seeing that if we think it would substantially help some
Representative Jack Ladyman
Unverified
1:47:44
other question so if we could do something like that or maybe another program where we could have full time employees versus travelling Rns
that would save us a lot of
Chair
Unverified
1:47:59
money is that correct? Yes, so a part of putting any kind of I just want to clarify this part of any kind ofhCC retention recruitment plan is going to cost money. that's part of the thing but it will be it is will be more cost effective and better for clients if it if we can implement and it costs a little more money but we still are cheaper than what we're utilizing on these contracts
every year, right? so that's what we're looking at. So though we we presented ALC a lot of numbers around these oncall contracts for HDCs the lawn is around
Speaker 27
1:48:36
we're spending around like 10 million a year on oncall contracts if what we're
Speaker 75
1:48:42
recommending in the recruitment plan is less than 10 million a
Speaker 27
1:48:47
year then this then we want we think it'll be worth it right because part of the value having
full time employees and not using contractor staff
Chair
Unverified
1:48:58
for them getting to know clients better and if you know clients better then you take better care of them and like Jennifer said some of the issues with this particular death was we had a lot
Speaker 233
1:49:09
of floaters in the house so we we're looking at all of all of those things right
Representative Jack Ladyman
Unverified
1:49:14
this second. so if we had employees who were full time employees who stayed at the job longer and I shouldn't say better trained but maybe better at executing
their training do you believe that that would reduce the risk of something like this happening in the future. thank y'all for being
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:49:45
here. thanks. right those were excellent pointspresentative ladyman. I know you've been very involved in this issue so thank you for that Representative in it would you like to make any
Representative Denise Jones Ennett
Unverified
1:49:56
closing remarks? Thank you Mister Chairman I like to thank the committee I know everybody was anxious to get back home after we gawled out I'd like to thank everybody for all the questions I was a little nervous presenting today but I'm glad that all these questions came up. I like to also thank the mother for being
here and I think she wants to say a couple of words afterwards if that's permissible can she come up? OK. I'm hoping in 2027 that this body can come up with some solutions so we can make these places better like I stated earlier I'm a mother of a 17 year old who has disabilities and so that pulled at my heartstring and so I just want to make sure that the people of Arkansas if they
have to put their children or their loved ones in these institutions
Speaker 62
1:51:02
that they're not going to die and that's all I have to say
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:51:09
thank you thank youpresentative bennett thank you for bringing this issue to this committee's attention it's very important one that we definitely need to be very serious about dressing in our upcoming session so thank you very much for that
and I do have on the sign up sheet
Miss Angela Stevens Miss Stevens, would you still like to say
Speaker 230
1:51:32
that makes some remarks you could guys can go
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:51:51
thank you Miss Stteens if you would you can just have a seat and you'll need to press the button and when it lights up just state
your name and then you'll be recognized you
Speaker 260
1:52:03
make make your remarks is Angela Stevens, mother of Zachary Moore I want to
Speaker 261
1:52:08
thank y'all for letting me speak today and being here. I appreciate it I know that there has been a settlement said but Moita's not bringing back Zachary
and I'm here because the next Zachary that is in the facility right now is not safe and that ick Zachary needs to be protected for the future and that's why I'm here to bring up I know there's a staff shorting. I understand that. I understand that is part of what has happened.
but from the statement that happened from the the incident there were two CAs that weren't couldn't even passcA test that were there that shouldn't have been on the floor if he they could not pass thecNA test. I don't see why they should be on the floor they're not being trained that DHS had said that they're going through all these trainings and everything and thencA classes these individuals had not could
not pass them yet they were still there carrying for my son and others another thing they had a chart they have to read to know each individual what their care needs are for the day. those staff members did not read and sign that that chart. they did not know that Zachary had to have his helmet on they did not know the procedures they did not follow. so where are the individuals above them that are supposed to be
implementing these procedures so these little things that could have been done to help for the safety of the staff and the safety of the the individuals that are living there for both of them but they're not being implemented since this incident they said that they have improved staff coming in
yet I don't agree with that because there's been an incident afterwards where a new hire has put it another re another resident in a coma for getting them high or getting drugging them right after the new hires so where's the drug test? where's the background test? where's the training? So these individuals are just this is a new hire. so these individuals are coming in there to care for our loved ones that are bringing in drugs to them and and putting them in the
hospital So and one more thing on the training it was just notified at Boomville that the same day that the settlement was signed for Zachary a manager managing nurse made the decision to place newly recruited uncertified CA staffs directly on the floor without training
without certification herr stated justification was committed and communicated to the staff members that was the facility is too short staffed to take the time to properly change train the people that were just hired and it was confirmed by the individuals by the staff that were in fact provided care shortly after without the training they were put on the floor so these training and everything that they're doing none of it got done. they said they were too short staffed so they just
put newly people had no idea what they're doing no trading whatever on the floor to care for people. and that was just happen the twentyseth the day that the settlement was signed. so where's the change this is like we all said this has been 8 months what has changed? What improvements for the other Zacharies out there are being done Has there been anything deq repaid the price for this to be noticed. so
what's going to come up his death in vain How can I help y'all understand
Speaker 262
1:56:46
and help for the next hackory not to go through this thank you Mrs Stevens and my heart
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
1:57:00
goes out to you as I know I think I can speak for everyone on this committee
Our heart goes out to you in this what I know is a very difficult situation so god bless you thank you for being here and thank you for those remarks or any other questions or comments from the
Representative Denise Jones Ennett
Unverified
1:57:25
committee Representative bennett you're recognize Thank you Mr chairir. I have a request from the DHS that you keep us abreast of all of the you know the recruitments the consultants reports and whatnot
also I have requested that you keep Miss Stevens reach out to her and talk to her about the issue that she told me that she was supposed to be whatever that conversation that she was promised if y'all can reach out to her and make sure that happens thank you all right seeing no further business before this committee we are adjourned thank you all very much
Agenda
A. Call to Order
B. Comments by the Chairs
C. Consideration of a Motion to Approve the October 8, 2025, Meeting Minutes [Exhibit C]
D. Discussion of Death at Southeast Arkansas Human Development Center [Exhibit D]
E. Other Business
F. Adjournment
Documents
| Title | Type | Pages | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agenda — STATE AGENCIES & GOVT'L AFFAIRS-SENATE, May 6, 2026 | Agenda | 1 | Official source ↗ |
| Exhibit C - Draft Minutes 10-8-2025 | Exhibit | 1 | Official source ↗ |
| Exhibit D - DHS Overview of Human Development Centers | Exhibit | 3 | Official source ↗ |
Speakers
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
Speaker 27
Chair
Unverified
Speaker 133
Speaker 126
Speaker 157
Representative Jimmy Gazaway
Unverified
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
Speaker 22
Speaker 53
Speaker 224
Speaker 30
Allison Guthrie
Unverified
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
Speaker 10
Senator Clarke Tucker
Unverified
Senator Kim Hammer
Unverified
Speaker 74
Speaker 165
Speaker 233
Representative David Ray
Unverified
Speaker 112
Speaker 181
Speaker 250
Representative Jack Ladyman
Unverified
Speaker 75
Representative Denise Jones Ennett
Unverified
Speaker 62
Speaker 230
Speaker 260
Speaker 261
Speaker 262