AIDS Agency Gets Break on Disbursements

D.C. Office Tardy Paying Nonprofits

D.C. Council member David A. Catania relented yesterday and, after excoriating the city's HIV/AIDS Administration for being "an obstacle" to the care and support of its target population, allowed officials five more days to figure out how to solve the agency's systemic payment problems.

Deputy Mayor Neil O. Albert promised his own direct involvement as top staff within the agency and the city Health Department work on a plan to present to the council's Health Committee on Wednesday afternoon. It will address the administration's continuing and lengthy delays in reimbursing the nonprofit groups that provide most of the AIDS-related services in the city -- delays that have helped bring several to the brink of financial crisis.

Albert nodded affirmatively as Catania (I-At Large) stressed that a different deadline was nonnegotiable. By next Friday, he said, the administration must have processed or paid all bills submitted by these organizations, a total that runs into the millions of dollars.

Albert also indicated interest in exploring Catania's proposal that the city do what Baltimore, New York City and Nassau County on Long Island have done: Hire an outside company or entity to receive, track and reimburse local providers' services and expenses in HIV and AIDS programs.

"It's a model we're going to look into," he said later. He offered no excuse for the current system. "This model hasn't worked," he said.

The week's gravest worry abated some yesterday with word that Whitman-Walker Clinic, the city's largest provider, had gotten enough financial cushion to finish paying employees their salaries from the previous Friday. Its board met this week and will do so again for the next two Tuesdays before voting on a fiscal restructuring plan. Management's proposal entails program cuts, though spokeswoman Kim Mills declined to detail them. "No cow was too sacred," she said.

The day-to-day fate of another center also seemed more secure by last night. Based on a late call from Albert assuring the Carl Vogel Center that its February and March reimbursements would be in hand by Tuesday, the center's board voted not to temporarily shut down.

"We're going to come back on Monday," Executive Director Ron Mealy said.

Several of the groups that pleaded their case before the Health Committee on Wednesday, when the HIV/AIDS Administration was given 48 hours to fix its system, responded positively to the possibility of city workers being stripped of the job of auditing and reimbursing their programs.

"They cannot manage money," said Jim Harvey of the D.C. Primary Care Association.

Kwame Roberts of RAP Inc., which provides mental health and substance abuse services, cautioned only that an outside contractor would need time to learn "the nuances" of the local provider community. Yet little could make matters worse, he said.

During the past few months, some organizations have been forced to suspend housing vouchers or utility assistance. Others have been unable to provide medication.

"The anxiety among people we serve has been extreme," Roberts said.