Join us in our pledge to give our kūpuna back their rights. Visit this link and sign the petition to Stop Nursing Homes from Using Forced Arbitration to Deny Residents' Rights.
Senior citizens across the country, including right here in Hawai‘i, are being robbed of their constitutional rights. Nursing homes are burying forced arbitration clauses in the fine print of their resident agreements. These clauses force elderly residents to sign away their right to go to court, even when they suffer physical or sexual abuse, neglect, or wrongful death.
Instead of presenting their cases in court, victims of elder abuse who have signed such agreements must resolve their disputes in secretive, private dispute systems that favor the corporate interests. For a more detailed view of the problems with forced arbitration, we recommend having a look at The Pop Tort's excellent outline of the issues in their article titled "End Nursing Home Forced Arbitration Now!" We heartily agree with their statement that "the very last thing we should be doing is allowing policies that remove this industry’s financial incentive to maintain safe facilities," and it troubles us to see that happening today through forced arbitration clauses.
Sadly, forced arbitration has become standard practice in the elder care industry, as it increasingly appears in all kinds of agreements for the sale of goods and services. Often, there is no alternative or way to remove these arbitration clauses from the agreements. Thus, it is fundamentally a question of consumer rights, and therefore a constitutional issue.
