Consumer Advocates for RCFE Reform (CARR) today announced that Calif. Assemblymember Cheryl R. Brown (D – San Bernardino) introduced the Excluded Persons Administrative Action List, or EPAAL legislation on Feb. 27, 2015. AB 1122 as it is now known, will require the Department of Social Services, Community Care Licensing (DSS/CCL) to publish on its website a list of all persons who have been excluded from owning, operating and/or working inside any licensed care facility as a result of an Administrative Law proceeding.
AB 1122 will provide convenient online access to the EPAAL, allowing assisted living residents, consumers and service providers to assure the caregivers and staff they hire have no prior history of behaviors which endangered the health or safety of an elder.
There is no mandatory requirement for DSS/CCL to refer elder neglect, abuse or other egregious behaviors perpetrated against elders residing in assisted living facilities to outside law enforcement, therefore few crimes perpetrated against elders in licensed care facilities are ever prosecuted.
Instead, through Administrative Law proceedings DSS/CCL can permanently or temporarily prohibit a person from working in a licensed care facility. But because the individual was never brought to justice through the criminal court system, the administrative sanction does not appear in a criminal background report.
