Nearly 80 organizations across California will receive $89 million in CalGrows grants to attract the next generation of home care workers.
The California Department of Aging announced the recipients last week, who became winners by proposing innovative ideas and incentives to recruit and train home care workers and family caregivers. The grantees include for-profit and nonprofit organizations, universities and training providers.
“CalGrows demonstrates the state’s commitment to equity by helping develop a direct care workforce that is trained to provide culturally appropriate care to serve California’s diverse population of older adults and people with disabilities,” said Mark Ghaly, MD, Secretary of the California Health & Human Services Agency. “We’re looking forward to seeing these investments reach Californians in their homes and in community settings, and we expect the funding to benefit this highly valued workforce.”
The grantees will use the funds to develop and scale training programs, provide incentives and stipends for completing training, offer career coaching and provide advanced opportunities for home- and community-based direct care workers. Direct care workers can include home care aides, care managers, dementia care specialists, activities coordinators and other caregivers. Unpaid family and friend caregivers can also participate in training programs.
California faces a potential shortage of up to 3.2 million direct care workers by the end of the decade, according to the California Health Care Foundation. California’s Master Plan for Aging includes a goal of creating up to a million high-quality caregiving jobs during that time. On average, direct care workers earn less than half of California’s median annual income, with one in four living below the federal poverty line. Most caregiving jobs are held by women, many of whom are immigrants.
Last fall, the state awarded a $16.2 million grant to San Francisco-based Homebridge, a nonprofit that supports the direct care industry through training and other services. That grant provides training and career opportunities to 500,000 caregivers.
