Argentum capped off a productive 2024 in advocacy with the enactment of the Senator Elizabeth Dole 21st Century Veterans Healthcare and Benefits Improvement Act. That legislation, signed into law by President Biden on January 2, 2025, will establish a pilot program to allow veterans to choose assisted living for their long-term care needs.
That's not all! Over the past year, Argentum led a nationwide campaign to counter misleading reporting and thwarted a related Congressional effort against the senior living industry, protected against onerous federal regulation, and advanced meaningful legislation to promote the value of assisted living, increase access and affordability, and expand workforce development programs.
For its efforts, Argentum's advocacy once again earned national recognition, being named for the fourth consecutive year as one of The Hill newspaper's top lobbyists of 2024.
TELLING OUR STORY
Telling the story of assisted living has been our primary advocacy focus this year, in an effort to educate lawmakers, the media, and the general public about both what assisted living is, and what it is not. Our efforts included: leading a nationwide campaign to counter misleading reporting and then thwarting a related Congressional effort against the senior living industry; promoting the need for private capital investment and successfully excluding assisted living from harmful federal legislation; and advancing several meaningful measures in Congress to support access and affordability of assisted living and to address the industry’s workforce needs.
- Public Policy Institute: Record attendance: 30 members of Congress (general session, receptions, meetings); 151 Congressional meetings to share constituent-perspectives of assisted living.
- Congressional Meetings: 260+ meetings with Federal lawmakers and their staff throughout 2024.
- Community Tours: 128 lawmakers visits to senior living communities in 2024.
- Silver PAC Reception: 22 members of Congress attended September event in Washington, D.C.
- Grassroots Campaigns: I ❤ Assisted Living to engage communities in telling the story of assisted living from a resident, family, and caregiver perspective; more than 1,000 grassroots letters sent on campaign and other priority legislation to increase co-sponsors and issue awareness.
- Reports: Released updated version of the Value of Assisted Living in America policy paper.
- “AHEAD with Argentum”: Weekly newsletter previewing issues and key developments on Capitol Hill, federal agency rulemaking, in the states, and how to get involved.
- “Seniors Policy Insider”: Weekly newsletter for Congressional staff highlights our policy priorities, reports and data, opportunities for community visits, and industry news.
- Member Policy Briefings: Monthly policy briefing for all Argentum Advocates members to learn about key developments in federal and state advocacy, with calls to action on engaging in our efforts.
- Congressional Briefings: House 21st Century Long-Term Care Caucus briefing in April on reauthorization of the Older Americans Act to promote our priorities on LTC workforce, the SENIOR Act, Care Across Generations Act, and the Veterans bill.
- Standing with Seniors: Re-launched grassroots website telling the story of senior living, with interactive map for policymakers and the public to get national, state, and Congressional-district level data on assisted living.
COUNTERING MEDIA NARRATIVES
Late in 2023, several prominent national publications began reporting on issues in assisted living. The reporting spanned more than six-months, was broadly negative in tone, and focused on assisted living costs, fees transparency, resident safety, and state/federal regulation. A lead author of one of the series indicated they would continue reporting until there is federal regulation of assisted living. Argentum raised significant concerns with the reporting, highlighting inaccuracies, misleading claims, and serious concerns with the data validity; with the support of NIC Map Vision data, we were able to credibly demonstrate that the claims of the reporters were misleading or inaccurate. As a result of our challenge to the series, the articles were not published until months after they had been initially expected.
Prompted by the reporting, the Senate Special Committee on Aging began a series of hearings in early 2024, including a call for residents and families in assisted living to share their experiences. In response, Argentum led its own campaign ("I ❤ Assisted Living") to tell the story of assisted living and reframe the narrative by providing a platform for residents, families, caregivers, and other stakeholders to share their experiences. With thousands of stories having been shared with lawmakers, we have been able to better educate them on our communities and residents and effectively push back on proposed legislation that would have impacted our ability to continue to allow seniors to call assisted living home.
PROTECTING PRIVATE INVESTMENT
Argentum successfully blocked an attempt to regulate private equity in assisted living by removing assisted living from the definition of a health care entity from the Health Over Wealth Act (S. 4804, H.R. 9156), introduced in July. Argentum was approached by Senator Ed Markey (D-MA) this Spring on plans for major legislation to regulate private equity in health care, spurred in part from the bankruptcy of Steward Health Care. The Health Over Wealth Act would have classified assisted living as a health care entity subject to HHS review of any agreement for a health care entity to sell to or lease from a REIT, of which HHS could block.
Argentum, the Massachusetts Assisted Living Association (Mass-ALA), our members, and other stakeholders led a months-long campaign to raise serious concerns about the consequences of limiting private capital investment in assisted living, and why assisted living should be removed the legislation. This included meeting with the primary bill sponsors and other key lawmakers, including SENIOR Act sponsor Rep. Lori Trahan (D-MA) to help amplify our concerns. Our message was echoed by an editorial published in the Journal of Health Affairs by a team of academic researchers studying private equity investment in assisted living; Argentum and NIC provided background and helped answer researchers questions in advance of the editorial’s publishing. The authors urged policymakers to pause and consider the unique structure, financing and history of assisted living before applying the same regulation as other healthcare sectors. Ultimately, assisted living was the only entity to be removed from the final version of the bill from its original draft version.
While the legislation did not advance in the 118th Congress, it is likely to be reintroduced in this next session. This is why it was so critical for the current version not to include assisted living, as legislative text that is reintroduced often carries over from previous iterations. It is especially important as private equity is continuing to gain interest from lawmakers and regulators at both the federal and state level; Argentum and our State Partners are regularly monitoring these developments and will similarly counter those efforts.
ADVANCING LEGISLATIVE SOLUTIONS
Argentum continues to advance legislative solutions at the federal level to address access/affordability of assisted living and our workforce needs:
- Renewed “SENIOR Act” Focused on Workforce and Affordability: Leading H.R. 7605, bipartisan legislation of grants for low-income seniors to afford assisted living and workforce development.
- Care Across Generations Act: Leading H.R. 6835, bipartisan legislation to provide grants to LTC communities to establish on-site childcare center or partner with an existing nearby childcare center.
- Expanding Assisted Living Access for Veterans: Lead Supporter of H.R. 1815 & S. 495, bipartisan legislation to allow veterans to choose assisted living over nursing homes; this legislation was subsequently rolled into the "Senator Elizabeth Dole 21st Century Veterans Healthcare and Benefits Improvement Act, and signed into law on January 2, 2025.
- Assisted Living Workforce Solutions: Supporting H.R. 1477 & S. 722, bipartisan legislation to expand eligible uses of tax-favorable 529 savings plans to cover workforce training and credentialing programs; Supporting H.R. 4520, legislation to provide tax credits for CNAs, LPNs, RNs, and personal care aides in assisted living communities located in opportunity zones.
- Growing the House Long-Term Care Caucus: Leading efforts to expand membership of the caucus, including briefings to engage lawmakers and staff on the need to invest in senior living.
