November 2024 Monthly Newsletter

Sally's partner Patty has Parkinson's and a caregiver at home helps to meet their everyday needs. The WA Cares Fund will help families like theirs cover the costs of long-term care.
Watch Sally’s story

Join us for our WA Cares Basics: What Workers Need to Know webinar on Jan. 15 from 11 a.m. until noon. We will cover what long-term care includes, how caregiving responsibilities impact families and the workplace, who contributes to the fund, how exemptions work, contribution requirements and more. Register today and stay tuned for our full 2025 webinar schedule.

ICYMI: Watch the replay of our WA Cares Conversations: Resources for New Family Caregivers webinar. Find recordings of more past webinars and learn more about upcoming webinars on our website.

Fund Fact: More than 800,000 Washingtonians provide care to a loved one.

Family caregivers often experience personal, professional and financial setbacks. Whether that's paying for care costs out of pocket, leaving the workforce or experiencing health impacts from stress, caregivers need support too. Washington state offers numerous resources to help family caregivers. Access educational and mental health resources for family caregivers on our website or learn more about the cost of caregiving in our monthly news item.

Monthly FAQ: How was the WA Cares Fund created?

The WA Cares Fund is the result of years of research on how to make long-term care affordable for everyone in Washington.

In 2015, the Legislature directed the Department of Social and Health Services to contract for an independent study of public and private options for helping people prepare for their long-term care needs. In stakeholder interviews, consensus emerged that a new program would need to:

• Offer affordable long-term care insurance coverage (public, private, or some combination).
• Provide meaningful “front-end” long-term care coverage to benefit more people.
• Be financially viable and sustainable in the long run.
• Reduce reliance on Medicaid long-term care for those who could reasonably afford alternatives.

Actuaries studied two options: a universal public long-term care insurance benefit and a public-private reinsurance model aimed at increasing the share of Washingtonians covered by private insurance.

The modeling found a universal public program would result in 88% of people aged 65+ being eligible for long-term care benefits over the long term, while a public-private reinsurance model had “limited potential to increase the prevalence of private long-term care insurance in the state.”

Read more about how the program was designed.

LTSS Trust Commission:

The Long-Term Services and Supports Trust Commission works on behalf of Washington employees and long-term care stakeholders to improve, monitor, and implement WA Cares. The Commission’s next meeting is on Dec. 11 from 1-4 p.m. Join the Zoom webinar. Find meeting details and learn more about the Commission. 

Rulemaking:

The three state agencies that administer the WA Cares Fund are all responsible for adopting rules for different areas of the program. Attend a stakeholder meeting with the Employment Security Department (ESD) to discuss ESD's WA Cares Fund draft rules. Topics include qualified individual requirements and determinations, definitions, and appeals.

• When: November 21, 2024, 9 a.m.
• Where: The stakeholder meeting will be held via Teams

Find the draft rules on the Rulemaking page. Information on how to participate in the meeting is under the “Rules under development” heading.