The Situation Report | February 27, 2023
Limited funds available – ACT NOW
The state Department of Health (DOH) has posted a Solicitation of Interest (SOI) for the “Nurses Across New York ” (NANY) Loan Repayment Program.”
Applications are due April 12 (before 4 pm).
HCA participated as members of the NANY Workgroup, which met in the summer of 2022, to guide the application and implementation process and we strongly advocated for the inclusion of home care agencies as a qualifying health care facility for the purposes of this program as they were not explicitly named in the NANY legislation.
Upon reviewing the SOI, HCA has identified an issue of concern that pertains to the ability of home care agencies (Article 36) to apply for the Nurses Across NY Loan Repayment Program in addition to individual RNs and LPNs employed in such agencies. While this seems to be allowed in the SOI narrative, a selection option for Article 36 agencies is omitted on the SOI’s Attachment 2 of the application, Part 1 (type of applicant) and Part 3 (f). The document does currently provide the option for a home care LPN or RN to apply as an individual applicant. HCA has submitted a request for clarification to the DOH and will provide members with an update as soon as possible.
This program is designed to help train and place registered professional nurses (RN) and licensed practical nurses (LPN) in underserved communities, in a variety of settings and specialties, including home care, to care for New York’s diverse population. The NANY Loan Repayment Program makes funds available to help recruit RNs and LPNs and encourage them to remain in medically underserved areas of the state (as defined in the SOI). Funding for student loan repayment is provided in exchange for a nurse’s commitment to work in an underserved area for a three-year period (NANY service obligation period).
Awards will provide up to: $25,000 for a RN or $10,000 for a LPN who agrees to practice in an underserved area for the three-year NANY service obligation period. Up to $2.5 million is currently available under this SOI. It is expected that 80 percent of the funding will be awarded to RNs and 20 percent to LPNs. Distribution of funding may be amended based on the pool of applications received. If additional funds become available, the DOH may make additional awards to qualified applicants until funding is exhausted.
Nurses shall be eligible for a loan repayment award to be determined by the DOH Commissioner over a three-year period to be distributed as follows: thirty percent of total award for the first year; thirty percent of total award for the second year; and any unpaid balance of the total award not to exceed the maximum award amount for the third year.
The allocation of funding is anticipated to be as follows:
- Approximately 50 percent of funding will be allocated to newly licensed nurses (i.e., those that have been licensed for two years or less).
- Approximately 50 percent of funding will be allocated to nurses who have been licensed two to five years.
- Nurses licensed for five years or more may be eligible if funding is available after initial awards are made.
Some important information includes:
- A nurse who seeks a NANY award to repay educational debt must have an employment contract or offer letter with a health care facility requiring the nurse to provide services for at least the entire NANY service obligation period.
- The health care facility or practice where the nurse will be employed must be located in an underserved area.
- The services that the nurse will provide under the employment contract must constitute full time clinical practice. This is the equivalence of 40 hours of service (with a minimum of 32 clinical hours) per week for at least 45 weeks per year. The calculation of full time employment may also be based on working a minimum of 150 hours of service per month, for 12 months of the year.
- The date on which the nurse’s employment contract begins must be no later than August 1, 2023.
- A health care facility is eligible for a NANY award for the period (August 1, 2023 – July 31, 2026) to provide a nurse with funds to repay outstanding educational debt.
NANY funds can be awarded to: (1) a nurse to pay qualified educational debt; or (2) a health care facility to help retain and recruit a nurse by providing that nurse funds to repay outstanding educational debt.
In all cases, 100 percent of the funds ultimately must be distributed to the nurse. No facility/employer should reduce a nurse’s compensation package because of receiving a NANY grant.
No more than five applications will be accepted from a health care facility with the same operating certificate number or health care facility that is a medical practice with the same Department of State Identification Number.
Written questions will be accepted until 4:00 p.m. on March 9, 2023 and should be submitted electronically to: NANY@health.ny.gov (with the subject line “NANY Cycle 1 Question”).
The pool of complete and eligible applications will be awarded in order of the date and time of receipt of initial application according to the funding allocations established in the SOI until available funding is exhausted for that region or provider category, as such HCA encourages the prompt submission of applications. DOH anticipates that awards will be announced in the summer of 2023. Awardees will have a NANY contract start date of August 1, 2023.