The California Assisted Living Waiver (ALW)
What is the California Assisted Living Waiver program (ALW)?
The Assisted Living Waiver (ALW) is a limited medi-cal waiver program which currently allows approximately 1,400 qualified individuals in California in certain counties (Los Angeles, San Bernardino, Fresno, Sonoma, San Joaquin and Riverside) to use medi-cal funding to receive care in ALW approved Residential Board and Care, Assisted Living and publicly subsidized housing sites.
Eligible patients are anyone 21 years of age or older who is eligible for medi-cal without a share of cost and who has been determined to need a "skilled nursing" level of care. In some instances, ALW will remove barriers which currently prevent low-income patients with certain conditions (eg. patients who require insulin shots) from living in RCFE or public housing settings.
What is Money Follows the Person (MFP) or nursing home transition?
One component of ALW is Money Follows the Person (MFTP) or nursing home transition which allows eligible individuals to move with their medi-cal dollars from institutional settings to home or community based care settings.
Nursing home transition does not involve new medi-cal dollars and holds the best promise for extending Olmstead relief to the most participants in California. If implemented properly it could save the state millions of medi-cal dollars a years (since care in an assisted living or RCFE setting is far more affordable than institutional care) and help fund portions of Olmstead that involve new medi-cal dollars: aging in place and transitioning from home to a RCFE.
Read about our Olmstead Now Campaign and our efforts to improve ALW and nursing home transition.