Caregivers must prove citizenship or risk losing licenses

When lawmakers passed a bill requiring proof of citizenship to get a business license, they likely weren't targeting Donna Stinea and the frail elderly who live in her Scottsdale home.

But Stinea, a Romanian immigrant, and more than 40 other assisted living facility owners in the Valley are at risk of losing their licenses if they can't provide the right documents.

Stinea has been a U.S. citizen for 25 years and has the papers to prove it. Like others on a state Department of Health Services list, however, it took time to track them down and, as of last week, she hadn't yet gotten the documents into the hands of licensing officials.

"They requested documentation. Then I got a letter saying I was refusing to provide the documents," she said. "It's hard to get the documents in a hurry."

It was a similar story for Adelina Somera, who had her married name on her driver's license and her maiden name on her passport.

Somera, a naturalized citizen from the Philippines who owns four assisted living homes, including two in Chandler, said she drove to the state licensing office last week to provide the documents, including her marriage license.

The law, passed last year, was sponsored by Rep. Russell Pearce, R-Mesa, and intended to prevent noncitizens from receiving public benefits or licenses by requiring proof of citizenship.

State health officials in charge of licensing assisted living facilities, nursing homes and child care centers started notifying license holders a few months ago about the citizenship requirement after the Arizona Attorney General's Office agreed that the law applied.

"This group has received quite a bit of notification," said Alan Oppenheim, deputy assistant director for licensing. "We really have no choice now but to be fairly aggressive in finding out why we are not getting what we need."

The law applies only to individuals, so large assisted living facilities, nursing homes and child care chains are not affected. In fact, the list of facilities that still need to provide documentation is exclusively small assisted living homes, housing 10 or fewer people.

Oppenheim said state licensing officials are scheduling meetings with owners of assisted living homes this week to find out why they haven't provided proof of citizenship. If those meetings aren't successful, fines and other sanctions could be forthcoming.

At worst, the homes would lose their licenses, and their elderly residents would be forced to move.

"That is absolutely the last thing that we would like to see happen," Oppenheim said. "But ultimately, we may have to deny the application."

It's likely that most license problems are simply paperwork, or procrastination, he said.

The law is among a raft of new citizenship requirements approved by the Legislature, and voters in 2004 and 2006, to ensure that illegal immigrants don't receive public benefits, including health care, child care subsidies, grants, loans or in-state college tuition. The vast majority of illegal immigrants in Arizona come from Latin America.

The licensing requirement is sweeping in a new group of people who generally come from other parts of the world and have been taking care of Arizona's aging residents for many years.

"It's a sacrifice to come to a new country, and a lot of Americans have no idea what that means," said Stinea, who has operated Assisted Living of Scottsdale for nearly 10 years. "If you have the guts to immigrate, why do they hate us lately?"

She's concerned about the spread of anti-immigrant sentiment in the U.S. and believes it's affecting a growing number of law-abiding citizens who are providing important services.

"In a nursing home, you're just another patient," she said. "In this home, you're somebody important. You're part of a family."