During the past year, NAELA’s focus has been on improving the quality of NAELA programming and services, strengthening member service, and enhancing member value.
With more than 25 years of service to the field of elder law and special needs planning and its practitioners, NAELA is the premier organization for those seeking information and education on how to improve the practice of law and build their practice.
Advocacy
Passage of the Special Needs Trust Fairness Act. NAELA achieved passage of its top priority, correcting a nearly quarter century error in the law. Thanks to successful NAELA lobbying and member advocacy, individuals with disabilities can now set up their own D-4-A special needs trust.
Preventing Restrictions to Medicaid Eligibility. After a House committee consideration of limitations to community spouse annuities and caps on home equity for Medicaid eligibility, NAELA educated members of Congress about the negative consequences of these proposals. Subsequently, neither proposal moved forward in committee. NAELA will continue to remain vigilant in preventing harmful restrictions in the next Congress.
Appeals Court Win on Housing for Special Needs Trust Recipients. The First Circuit Appeals Court held that distributions from a first-party trust do not automatically constitute income for calculating rent for house vouchers. NAELA, the Special Needs Alliance, and the National Housing Law Project submitted an amicus brief on the case, supporting the plaintiff. The court referenced the brief in its decision.
Advancing Access to Home and Community-Based Services. NAELA made this a priority for the first time this Congress. Advocacy included:
• Support of the Disability Integration Act introduced by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. This legislation would make access to home and community-based services a civil right.
• Acted as a key organizer of disability and aging advocates to lobby to extend the Money Follows the Person demonstration project, which supports individuals transitioning out of a nursing home and back into the community. There is bipartisan support on this issue, and a good chance it will get reauthorized in the next Congress.
• The NAELA Foundation provided a grant to Consumer Voice, the leading non-profit focused on ensuring high standards in LTC facilities, to work on ensuring appropriate guidance gets created for seniors and other individuals with dementia as states transition to comply with the HCBS Settings rule.
Bittersweet Success with CMS Ban on Forced Arbitration Provisions for Nursing Homes. NAELA worked with other advocates to lobby CMS to ban pre-dispute arbitration agreements for nursing home admissions as a condition of accepting access to Medicare and Medicaid funds. There, we were a success. Unfortunately, a Federal court, sympathetic to the public policy issue, issued a preliminary injunction citing agency overreach. It remains unclear if CMS, under the new administration, will move forward with the case.
Continued Leadership Among Peers. NAELA staff David Goldfarb co-chairs the Leadership Council of Aging Organizations’ (LCAO) Health Committee. LCAO represents over 70 aging organizations, including AARP, Alzheimer’s Association, Center for Medicare Advocacy, Justice in Aging, and the National Association of Area Agencies on Aging. This position will be critical going forward in the fight to protect Medicaid and Medicare in 2017.
Community
Peer-to-peer connections expand your knowledge and your network, allow you to connect with fellow elder law and special needs planning attorneys, and offer ways to become active in the community.
• National listserv to ask questions and provide subject matter expertise
• Face-to-face meetings where you can learn and build your network
• Section membership for practice-area-specific information and interaction through the Section listservs, webinars, and newsletters
• Chapter membership for state-specific education, networking, and advocacy
Opportunities to become active on the national and state level.
Joining a NAELA committee will put you in touch with NAELA members with a variety of backgrounds and experience. You can learn from your experience on the committee as well as increase your reputation. State Chapters have many committee opportunities as well.
Online membership directory gets you clients and referrals.
The NAELA online “Find a Lawyer” directory is the most popular part of NAELA’s website in terms of monthly hits from consumers looking for elder law and special needs planning attorneys and from NAELA members looking for out-of-state referrals.
Members who develop their online profile in the membership directory make it easy for consumers and fellow attorneys to know more about his or her practice area, languages spoken, and more. Adding a photo further personalizes the listing.
Stay in-the-know with monthly emails.
• The Member Value Connection highlights the many different NAELA member benefits.
• Advocacy Update provides quick updates and calls to action regarding NAELA’s current public policy priorities.
Education
NAELA offers many opportunities for learning and research.
• NAELA Knowledge Base is your key to locating NAELA Journal and NAELA News articles as well as recordings of past webinars and seminars from live events. Most material is available for download free. Locate by keyword, author, date range, and more.
• NAELA Journal is published twice a year and brings you in-depth, substantive articles covering important elder law and special needs planning topics. Case notes and book reviews round out each issue.
• NAELA News is published quarterly, bringing you news about the elder law and special needs planning community as well as member profiles and substantive articles you can use in your practice.
• The weekly eBulletin is chock-full of curated news from around the country as well as several case notes in each issue.
• NAELA’s Lunch & Learn webinars are based on popular NAELA News and NAELA Journal articles and are your chance to learn more about the subject as well as discuss it with the author and fellow participants.
• National webinars cover hot topics in elder law and special needs planning as well as advocacy issues.
• Two face-to-face meetings: the Annual Conference and Summit
• NAELA Essentials, a two-part program that provides attorneys the opportunity to build a solid foundation of knowledge toward his or her elder law and special needs planning practice. It includes an online course and a face-to-face workshop.
• Section webinars
• Practicing Proficiently: The Small/Solo Office webinar series produced in partnership with Stetson University College of Law
You can see the many ways NAELA is working for you. Join us again in 2017. We can’t wait to see what the year will bring!