People who live in long term care facilities count on Medicaid payments for most of their basic needs, but some necessities have to be paid for by a stipend they receive from state government.

But not all states are the same, and many are saying New Jersey is grossly underfunded.

Senior correspondent Brenda Flanagan has more on their request for an increase and a proposed bill that could make the change as part of our ongoing series Under the Dome.

You can't do it.

You can't even go to a dollar store and get things, you know.

It's just impossible.

Stacy Moore's disabled.

She lives at the Preakness long term care facility in Wayne, where Medicaid pays her room, board and care.

For everything else, she struggles to make ends meet with what's called a personal needs allowance.

In New Jersey, it's 50 bucks a month.

And then I have a rental of the landline telephone, so I end up with forty one dollars and twenty cents a month to live off of.

And that's.

Everything, toothpaste, shampoo, conditioner, everything.

We get fifty dollars a month and that pays for very little snacks here, two dollars for a bag of potato chips.

Haircuts are twenty five dollars.

I just had a haircut.

Twenty five bucks.

Lou Bonilla depends on Medicaid to cover his room, board and care at the complete care facility in Brick.

He's a former musician, a guitar player who loves to listen to music, but he can't really afford to download songs.

I feel like it's unmanageable.

It doesn't go far.

I'm broke by the 15th.

Sometimes I have to ask my brother for extra money for snacks.

Yeah, it's pretty rough.

There's like 32 states that pay a higher rate than New Jersey pays.

And right now, fifty dollars a month is just a dollar sixty seven a day.

It's literally not even a cup of coffee a day that the residents are getting.

New Jersey's long term care ombudsman estimates some 30,000 Medicaid residents surrendered all their savings, pension payments and Social Security checks to reside in these facilities.

On 50 bucks a month, many can only afford hand me down clothing.

They will pick from clothes that are available from residents who have passed on.

And sometimes that's how they get new clothes.

This is just not a dignified way to live.

She supports a bipartisan bill, S. Thirty three, 19, that had raised Jersey's personal needs allowance to one hundred and forty dollars a month with federal subsidies that had cost the state 15 to 16 million dollars more a year, according to calculations by the nonpartisan Office of Legislative Services.

The measure is one unanimous support from both Assembly and Senate committees, but still hasn't been posted for a vote in the legislature.

Co-sponsor Democrat Senator Andrew Zwicker admits with federal Medicaid cutbacks looming, there's some fiscal tension.

If you are very fiscally conservative, you question everything when it comes to what government should spend.

I get that.

But like I said, it's a just a tiny, tiny fraction of money compared to the entire state budget.

And the impact is so enormous.

And so I am optimistic that when we come back into session in the fall, that we can get this done on the governor's desk.

Republican co-sponsor Senator Carmen Amato met with nursing home residents and agrees current monthly allowances from the state have not kept up with inflation and are too small to have a meaningful financial impact.

This legislation would increase the state's personal needs allowance to strengthen quality of life and ease some of the financial burden for those residents.

And they are lobbying.

I've been trying to get in touch with Governor Murphy for a long time.

And First Lady Miss Tammy, because they came here and spoke to me before they got elected and they asked me back then, how can we help you?

The governor's press secretary said in a statement, we will respectfully decline to comment on pending legislation for long term care residents.

It's frustrating.

It just keeps getting passed along.

It's it's it's been three years.

It's time they sign it.

He says it would mean so much to just order a snack and listen to his music.

I'm Brenda Flanagan, NJ Spotlight News.

This program is made possible in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the American people.

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