July 2020 – Executive Director’s Monthly Report

A message from our Executive Director

TO: Dr. Gisele Ragusa, Board President & Board of Directors, San Gabriel / Pomona Valleys Developmental Services, Inc.
FROM: Anthony Hill, M.A. J.D. Esq., Executive Director
RE: Executive Director’s Report

COVID-19 Pandemic

It has been 125 days since Governor Newsom’s stay at home order in response to our shared responsibility to reduce the spread of COVID-19. Recently, California like many other states began the process of opening channels and streams of commerce. An indispensable first step to stave off food insecurity, rising unemployment, widening economic and health care disparities, safe return of children and college students to brick and mortar classroom settings, restoration of customers, the life-line for our small businesses, and expanding opportunities for work to be performed in traditional settings. Indeed, tailoring health care and economic policy in tandem to slow the rate of spread of COVID-19 has been challenging.

Los Angeles County, and several California Counties are hotspots, where positive COVID-19 cases are rising. We are in a surge. In response to the surge, on July 2, 2020 SG/PRC leadership took decisive action as we pivoted our business functions to a “Monitoring Phase.”

• We temporarily closed our business office from public use.
• We increased our remote workforce from 93% to 98%.
• We suspended our Intake and Eligibility services.
• We created restrictive entry zones within our office protecting work areas where employees perform work supporting our critical functions.

Accordingly, as ongoing practice all SG/PRC employees before entry and while within our office space are required to wear masks, practice social distancing, avoiding in- person meetings, engage frequent handwashing, and are repeatedly reminded to remain at home if sick. Our cleaning and sanitizing programs remain robust and are implemented both during and after business hours.

Mrs. Tabitha Medina

Many of you are aware that COVID-19 has shaken us, as it has taken the life of one of our own. Our beloved Mrs. Tabitha Medina, Human Resource Specialist, winner of the 2018 Delores Perry Award for SG/PRC employee of the year. We are grieving our heartbreaking loss, and those of Tabitha’s family members.

Tabitha, you remain with each of us always as do your kindness and generosity that fuels us daily as we serve the SG/PRC mission.

SG/PRC Employee Potential COVID-19 Exposure July 2, 2020

On July 4th, 2020, we were notified that an employee had tested COVID-19 positive. When tracing potential contacts of that employee, we discovered that employee had been in a large room with other SG/PRC employees during a listening session for Tabitha occurring on July 2, 2020. The only persons potentially exposed were SG/PRC employees.

Some of the potentially exposed employees were allocated to our remote workforce around 11 a.m. on July 2, 2020, and those employees that had not been allocated were immediately allocated to our remote workforce, referred to our workman’s compensation carrier for COVID-19 testing, began self-quarantining, and our office space was sanitized and cleaned. We have good news to report. All employees connected with this incident tested COVID-19 negative, and we have confirmation that there was no spread of COVID-19 between employees within the workplace.

SG/PRC Employee Potential COVID-19 Exposure July 6, 2020

On July 2, 2020, our Clinical Director emailed SG/PRC employees encouraging them to avoid social gatherings as a preventative measure to protect their health and safety during the 4th of July, Holiday. Later during that night an employee attended a party ( non-business-related social gathering). On July 6, 2020 that employee without any symptoms of COVID-19 reported to work and performed work in the SG/PRC office. Later that afternoon, that employee was notified that a person attending that party on July 2, 2020 tested positive for COVID-19. That employee sought and received COVID-19 testing and notified us at 9:45 p.m. that they tested positive for COVID-19.

Our onsite workforce on July 6, 2020 was 13 employees. When tracing potential contacts of that employee, we determined that two employees had potential exposure, while wearing masks and social distancing greater than 6 feet. The employee that tested positive was allocated to our remote workforce and began self-quarantine. Our office space was sanitized and cleaned. We have good news to report. Both potentially exposed employees tested COVID-19 negative, and we have confirmation that there was no spread of COVID-19 between employees while within the workplace.

SG/PRC COVID-19 Risk Management/Mitigation Strategies

We continue to review, assess, and adjust our policies, practices, clinical resources, and surge capacity to protect the health and safety of individuals served as follows:

1. We are holding daily SG/PRC leadership meetings to monitor SG/PRC’s critical business functions, and to triage COVID-19 related service needs for individuals served, and securing supports for them, their families and Service Providers.
2. We are expanding our staffing registries inclusive of licensed and unlicensed staffing.
3. We are triaging COVID-19 residential settings hot spots, with quality assurance, nursing services, clinical supports, and leadership oversight.
4. We are partnering with the Local Public Health Department, Department of Health Care Services and the Department of Developmental Services aligning clinical resources, delivering technical support, and encouraging implementation of prevention strategies to manage the spread of COVID-19 in licensed residential settings.
5. We are making telephone contacts with individuals served to assess their IPP/IFSP service and technology needs.
6. We are meeting every Monday (10 a.m.-12 p.m.) through Zoom with our Vendor Community for review of Department of Developmental Services (DDS) Directives, public health policy guidance and updates, Best Practices, and planning for reengagement of service delivery (averaging 230 participants).
7. We are meeting every Tuesday (10 a.m.-11a.m.) through Zoom with the SG/PRC Community to clarify the meaning of DDS Directives, and to connect families with SG/PRC resources and resources available in our community (averaging 150 participants).
8. We have distributed 11000 pieces of Personal Protective Equipment.
9. We are completing special incident reports and conducting COVID-19 surveillance.
10. We are conducting remote quality assurance visits, facility inspections, and investigations.
11. We are providing daily clinical and nursing consultation and supports for individuals served.
12. We are monitoring budget policy and legislation impacting the Developmental Services system.

CFO Announcement

Ms. Rosa Ham, Interim CFO, is now our ongoing CFO effective July 20, 2020. Ms. Ham has served SG/PRC over the past 21 years, as an Accountant, Operations /Accounting Manager, and Controller. Particularly, during the past 6 months, Ms. Ham has performed in dual roles, seamlessly incorporating COVID-19 workload. Ms. Ham has assured that our fiscal systems, policies, internal controls, asset protection devices, trust management programs, auditing functions, reporting and disclosure requirements, roll over process, and OPS and POS budgets conform with DDS standards, contract and regulatory requirements.

SG/PRC Budget FY19/20

Our FY 19/20 Operations Budget (OPS) will balance yearend. Our FY 19/20 Purchase of Service (POS) Budget will reflect a yearend deficit due to COVID-19 expenditures. FY19/20 Budget revise includes details to offset these COVID-19 related expenditures.

SG/PRC Budget FY20/21

We received our base allocation from prior year FY19/20 and growth dollars in FY20/21 Budget. The California Health and Human Services Budget / Developmental Services did not receive any cuts. However, California’s overall Budget is premised on both drawing down rainy-day reserves and tethering the assumption of federal dollars earmarked for COVID-19 relief funding occurring before October 2020. If federal COVID-19 relief funding does not occur, unavoidable FY20/21 state budget adjustments might impact Developmental Services.