Los Angeles County supervisors approve wage increase for in-home caregivers

LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to approve a raise for more than 140,000 In-House Supportive Services caregivers.

Supervisors voted 4-1 in favor of the wage increase from $9.65 an hour to $11.18 by 2017. Caregivers will be paid $11 an hour starting in 2016 and receive $0.18 more the next year.

In order to cover the county's costs of the increase, the board will allocate $11.9 million to the Department of Public Social Services budget for the 2015-2016 fiscal year and another $30.6 million for the following fiscal year.

The increase comes less than a week after the Los Angeles City Council approved a $15 per hour minimum wage. Next week supervisors will be looking into raising the county's minimum wage to $15 an hour as well. But because the health care workers are paid through a state program, they would not benefit from the minimum wage increase.

Supervisors Mark Ridley Thomas and Hilda Solis, who both motioned for the approval of the increase, said the current wage for caregivers is a "poverty wage." The in-home health care workers look after low-income patients who are blind, disabled or over the age of 65 as a way to keep them in the comfort of their own home instead of being placed in an expensive care facility.

Union research shows that 81 percent of in-home caregivers live in poverty, with 33 percent relying on public assistance and 18 percent depending on food stamps to feed their families.

City News Service contributed to this report.