On Friday, the Executive Office of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors announced Max Huntsman has been appointed as interim Inspector General to oversee the County’s skilled nursing home facilities.
On May 26, the Board voted unanimously to appoint an Inspector General to oversee skilled nursing home facilities, which account for more than half of the County’s deaths from COVID-19.
Huntsman, who has served as the first-ever County’s Inspector General overseeing accountability for both the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s and Probation departments since 2013, will now also be tasked with developing recommendations on how to strengthen oversight for skilled nursing home facilities and how to improve their operations long-term until a final recruitment and selection is completed.
“Max is strategic and engaged and has the experience we need to bring much-needed accountability to the County’s skilled nursing homes,” said Celia Zavala, Executive Officer of the Board. “He has a track record of making progressive change and we are confident he will help the County ensure real, substantive shifts for our most vulnerable communities to receive the care and oversight they deserve.”
Huntsman is a seasoned County employee with 29 years of service. He has progressively responsible experience working for the office of the District Attorney. He is known for leading anti-corruption efforts, conducting investigations and prosecuting white collar crime throughout his law career.
“I am in strong support of the Board’s desire to do everything we can to improve nursing home care,” said Huntsman. “My staff is looking forward to working closely with state and County partners to identify an emergency management system and oversight process that will promote the best care possible for this highly vulnerable patient population. We’re reaching out to medical professionals in and outside of government and working closely with the Auditor-Controller, with whom we have a strong working relationship. We hope to help bring about real change.”
The first task at hand will be for Huntsman to conduct an exhaustive review of the county’s oversight mechanisms for skilled nursing facilities that care for some of our most vulnerable residents — the elderly, the low-income and the disabled.
The County’s numerous skilled nursing homes have historically received low marks for quality of care, patient satisfaction and employee pay.
Huntsman will be expected to provide a proposed scope of work to the Board by August 1 that outlines a schedule for completing a full report on his findings, and report back with interim reports every 60 days until a final report is completed.
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1 Comment
knowledge needed of profit margin in relation to staff/patients. Number of behavior altering drugs with reasons: some patients are not wearing their glasses and there is a distortion. Some have feeding tubes instead of looking toward their gums/teeth. There needs to be RN’s involved in total patient care and not have Nsg homes as their 2nd job. Instead of taking my mother to the bathroom, they returned her to bed to urinate and deficate in the bed. Spanish spoken while employees on duty to patients who only understand English. Employees watching Spanish language TV stations while on duty. Doctor’s order states Turn every 2 hours and my husband was never turned. There needs to be more staff per patient load. Nursing homes are run by people only interested in a profit. Staff members constantly stole my mother’s clothing. You need a “Drill Sergeant” mentality as Director of Nursing with patient care as a priority. In fairness to the facility, I informed the nursing homes, that I was an RN and knew what good patient care was all about. They didn’t care. When my mother died, I almost had an independent autopsy because my husband and I were on vacation at the time.