Section 28: Accreditation of homemaker services; board, establishment, members, staff and services; standards; rules and regulations; restrictions; enforcement
Section 28. For the purposes of this section the following words shall, unless the context otherwise requires, have the following meanings:
(1) ''Homemaker services'', care of individuals in their own homes, or helping individuals and families to achieve adequate household and family management, where the service is rendered by a person who receives a third party payment for said service or is employed for the purpose of rendering such services by other than the family or household receiving said service.
(2) ''Person'', any department, office, commission, committee, council, board, division, bureau, institution, or authority of the commonwealth or its political subdivisions, and any individual, partnership, corporation, or other legal entity.
There shall be in the department a board of accreditation of homemaker services, hereinafter called the board, consisting of the secretary of elder affairs or his designee, the secretary of health and human services or his designee, the commissioner of children and families, who shall be chairman, the secretary of the commissioner of transitional assistance or his designee, the commissioner of public health or his designee, the commissioner of the department of early education and care or his designee, the president of the Massachusetts Council for Homemaker-Home Health Aide Services and seven members appointed by the commissioner, one of whom shall be a director of a homemaker service organization, one a homemaker, and five consumers of homemaker services. The director of a homemaker service organization, the homemaker and three of the five consumers shall be selected from a list of twenty-six persons, which shall be submitted to the commissioner by the Massachusetts Council for Homemaker-Home Health Aide Services, of whom three shall be directors of homemaker service organizations, three shall be homemakers and twenty shall be consumers of homemaker services. The remaining two consumers shall be selected from lists of senior citizens submitted to the commissioner by statewide organizations representing the interests of the elderly.
Each member of the board appointed by the commissioner shall serve for a term of two years, and any vacancy on the board due to causes other than expiration of a term shall be filled for the remainder of the unexpired term.
The commissioner may provide such staff and services, including, but not limited to clerical and secretarial services, as the board may reasonably require.
Members of the board established by this section shall serve without compensation for their services, but the appointive members may be reimbursed by the department for their expenses necessarily incurred in the performance of their duties.
Utilizing, but not being limited to, the standards set by the National Council for Homemaker-Home Health Aide Services for accreditation of agencies providing homemaker services, and in accordance with its rules and regulations, the board may accredit any person providing homemaker services. Accreditation shall be for a term of two years, and shall be renewable, in accordance with the board's rules and regulations; provided however, that the board may not deny accreditation, refuse to renew accreditation, or revoke accreditation until after a hearing before a hearing officer.
In no case shall revocation of such accreditation take effect in less than thirty days after written notification by the board to the person.
Any action of the board denying accreditation, refusing to renew accreditation, or revoking accreditation shall be subject to chapter thirty A of the General Laws.
The board may, when public necessity and convenience requires or to prevent undue hardship to an applicant, under such rules and regulations as it may adopt, grant a temporary, provisional, or probationary accreditation provided, however, that no such accreditation shall be for a term exceeding one year.
Accreditation shall not be transferable or assignable and shall be issued only to the named person.
Upon petition of the board, the superior court shall have jurisdiction to enjoin any violation of the provisions of this section or to take such other action as equity and justice may require.
No person shall provide homemaker services in the commonwealth without accreditation in accordance with the provisions of this section.