A Human Service Budget That Will Cripple Nursing Homes
by Senator Steve Green

We recently passed a Human Services budget out of the Senate. It included a number of bad provisions. The whole bill was very disappointing. Overall, it will amount to over $1 billion in reductions over the next four years. These cuts are going to affect long-term care facilities, disability services, and nursing homes. This is going to hit every area of the state. But what I really want to focus on is the nursing home cuts that will be coming directly to Senate District 2.

A few months ago, I wrote a piece about Governor Walz’s proposed nursing home cuts and how they would affect nursing homes in our part of the state. Those were already troubling. This bill paints an even bleaker picture. Governor Walz’s proposal meant nearly $10 million for nursing home cuts in our district. The Human Services bill that Democrats just passed now includes over $12 million in cuts over the next four years. These are what the updated numbers look like:

• Havenwood Care Center in Bemidji – $3,029,824
• LakeWood Care Center in Baudette – $1,168,009
• Neilson Place in Bemidji – $3,299,194
• Cornerstone Nursing and Rehab in Bagley – $2,082,859
• Good Samaritan Society in Blackduck – $623,120
• Mahnomen Health Center in Mahnomen – $1,819,961

These cuts are unacceptable to me. How do we explain this to our loved ones, who will likely lose access to facilities, services, and care that they rely on in their later years? How do we explain these cuts to the workers in these facilities, that asked for help in 2024 and were only offered a band-aid?

Yet alongside these cuts, Democrats are choosing to preserve a costly taxpayer-funded healthcare program for illegal immigrants – MinnesotaCare. Since the program launched in 2025, 17,396 undocumented immigrants have enrolled in this program. It was originally estimated that only 5,874 would enroll total in the first year. Well actual enrollment is triple that so far, and we’re only three months in. Cost projections for this have now risen to over $600 million for the next four years – three times above its original estimation. Republicans offered amendments to repeal this program and redirect funding to our seniors and other disability services. Democrats shut down debate using procedural rulings. It was shameful behavior.

If we can’t help legal Minnesotans in nursing homes who have lived here, paid taxes here, and contributed to our state, why should we reward those who are here illegally?

Despite the poor state of the bill, we were able to offer amendments to make it slightly better. One of our amendments redirected unspent funding to support Critical Access Nursing Facilities – this is vital for rural areas. We also were able to eliminate county cost shifts. Before this amendment, the bill included a major cost shift to counties disguised as a “budget solution,” which would have resulted in extreme property tax hikes. These two amendments were necessary, but they didn’t do enough to fix the bill. In my opinion, the whole bill is beyond fixing.

I also want to note that fixing those cost shifts came at a high price. We essentially had to defer funding from future disability waiver services. That means the fix is temporary. We are going to have revisit this issue to replenish these funds at some point. That means the county cost shifts might be on the table again in the future. The best long-term way we can bring relief without cutting services nor shifting costs is by lifting state mandates and allowing local governments to use their funding in ways that best fit their counties’ needs. Things might be “solved” in that area for now, but expect this issue to come up again in future legislative sessions.

Now this bill will be in conference committee, and we have to hope the House reels these cuts back in. This is not a budget bill with Minnesotans in mind. It’s yet another partisan bill that prioritizes the needs of an agency over the needs of people.