Janice Wright replaced as Health Care Financing-Policy chief

CARSON CITY, Nev. - Janice Wright, criticized for delays in programs to help severely disabled Nevadans, has been demoted as head of the state Health Care Financing and Policy Division.

Wright was replaced Tuesday by Charles Duarte, head of Hawaii's Medicaid program - which was criticized recently by advocates for the poor.

Duarte takes over from Wright in mid-August. Hawaii's Medicaid chief since 1997, he was chosen for the $83,554-a-year Nevada job by state Human Resources Director Charlotte Crawford.

Wright, who will stay on within HRD, has been under fire because of delays in help promised more than a year ago for the severely disabled. What began months ago as complaints escalated recently into threatened court action.

Nevada lawmakers decided in May 1999 to approve a Guinn administration plan to spend $1 million in Medicaid funds to help the severely disabled avoid being institutionalized. The program was to have helped 30 severely disabled people this fiscal year and another 30 in the coming fiscal year.

The current fiscal year ends Friday, there's still a long waiting list for the benefits, and none of the money has been spent.

The delays had been questioned by representatives of the Northern Nevada Center for Independent Living, Nevada Disability Advocacy and Law Center, Nevada Disability Forum, and Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada.

In Hawaii, the American Civil Liberties Union had claimed in April that state's QUEST program, which provides managed health care to low-income families, may have violated federal law. Duarte had been overseeing the program.

The ACLU said QUEST wasn't providing adequate medical care to the poor, especially children and pregnant women, and an application process was slow and broke federal law by asking inappropriate questions.

The QUEST program also faced complaints earlier this month about the long wait inmates released from prison face in getting drug treatment.

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