All that is separating a couple who have been married for 63 years from being together in the same residential care home is a signature.

The governor's signature.

Once the bill is signed, Terry and Sidney Kaide of Hilo will be able to live in the same residential foster care home under a measure that was approved by the state Senate yesterday. A similar measure cleared the House on April 15.

It was a wonderful way for Terry Kaide to spend her 87th birthday. Last night, Terry Kaide and her three daughters and their families gathered in Kailua for her birthday and to toast a future where she and her husband, Sidney, can be together every day.

Before the Hilo couple can make any moves into the same residential care facility, the governor must sign the measure and the state Department of Human Services must make rules to enforce the measure.

The governor has indicated she will sign the bill at 11:30 a.m. today.

"We're so excited and thankful," said the Kaides' daughter, Charlotte Kaide. "Can you imagine waiting for two years for something like this to happen? It's my mom and dad's dream to be together."

After it passed, Terry Kaide, 87, and her daughters went around the Legislature thanking lawmakers for their efforts.

"I haven't spoken to my husband yet," said Kaide, who is in a wheelchair, while her husband is confined to a bed in a Hilo adult residential foster home. "He knows what we've been doing. I was told the bill would pass, but I wasn't sure until I heard it."

Currently, two non-Medicaid patients cannot live in the same adult residential foster home, even if the two people are married. But the bill will allow married couples, reciprocal beneficiaries, siblings, the parents of a child or best friends to do so.

Before the measure passed, the law was designed to protect Medicaid patients, giving priority to low-income patients to provide equal access to individual care offered in a residential foster care, which allows only up to three patients.

They aren't sure how soon they can move in. But they hope that an exception will be made for the couple.

"If it's possible she can move in to the empty bed next to my dad, we'll do it," Charlotte Kaide said. "That will be so awesome. If that's the case, we'll fly back tomorrow."