The authors of the video openly admit that the content is disturbing.

None of these people or organizations ever acknowledge that there are exceptions to these sunny scenarios. None of them ever acknowledge our loved ones with severe/profound I/DD or autism, or the struggles our families face in trying to find the resources required to help them live their best possible lives.

By Michelle Diament, Disability Scoop, October 8, 2021

With President Joe Biden’s $3.5 trillion plan to expand the nation’s social safety net being chopped, disability advocates are fighting to keep a massive investment in Medicaid waivers alive.

Biden acknowledged this week that his spending plan would be slashed by at least a trillion dollars after Democrats were unable to secure enough support to pass the measure.

“Look, my objective is to get everything that I campaigned on passed eventually. It won’t all happen at once,” Biden said.

The plan includes Biden’s proposal earlier this year to invest $400 billion in Medicaid home and community-based services. The money would go toward two major undertakings — getting people with disabilities off of waiting lists for Medicaid waiver services and shoring up the workforce of direct support professionals.

Already, the U.S. House of Representatives cut spending on the home and community-based services proposal in what’s known as the reconciliation bill by more than half to $190 billion. Advocates said that number would be inadequate to increase access to services and address workforce issues and they were pressing for more. But now they fear that funding for home and community-based services could get scrapped from the bill altogether.

By Diane Morrow-Kondos, Tulsa Kids, October 6, 2021

here are many myths and misunderstandings about people with intellectual disabilities. People tend to believe what they’ve heard or experienced, but sometimes that means information that isn’t entirely accurate. As the sibling of a brother with disabilities, I’ve experienced some of these misperceptions. I may have even believed a few of them at one time. We all make mistakes. The important thing is being open to learning and changing. Today’s blog will scratch the surface by looking at five common myths or misperceptions.

There are some syndromes, such as Williams Syndrome, which include a happy temperament amongst the defining characteristics. Williams Syndrome is a genetic condition that is present at birth. One of the common attributes found in people with Williams Syndrome is a highly social personality. However, most people with intellectual disabilities experience the same gamut of emotions we all do. One recent evening, I was attempting to have a phone conversation with my brother. He was struggling more than usual to express his thoughts. Finally, he sighed and said, “bad day.” We all have good days and bad days, including people with intellectual disabilities. It would be unfair to place an unrealistic expectation of perpetual smiling happy attitudes on people based solely on their intellectual disabilities.

When most people hear the term intellectually disabled, they envision someone with Down Syndrome. Persons with Down Syndrome are most likely to be featured in television shows and advertisements when an intellectually disabled person is presented. The image of a person with Down Syndrome has become almost synonymous in most people’s minds with intellectual disabilities. Down Syndrome is the result of an extra chromosome, forty-seven instead of forty-six. Worldwide, Down Syndrome occurs in one out of every 600-700 births.

Kaiser Family Foundation, October 4, 2021

A new KFF analysis examines key characteristics of children with special health care needs, the affordability and adequacy of their health coverage, and the implications for such children of potential new federal Medicaid money to assist families in caring for them.

Medicaid is a significant source of coverage for medical, behavioral health, and long-term services and supports for children with special health care needs, including home and community-based services (HCBS) that they need to live at home with their families. During the pandemic, children have experienced health care disruptions, mental health challenges, and economic hardships, and these issues may have been intensified for those with special health care needs.

A labor shortage has unleashed a litany of problems for Florida employers scrambling to fill vacant slots and hold on to workers.

But for some of the state’s most vulnerable citizens who receive around-the-clock care in residential facilities, the competition for workers is having more-dire consequences.

More than 100 group homes for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities have shuttered since March, and more closures might be on the horizon, providers warn, unless the Legislature boosts funding for the facilities.

Craig Cook, executive director of Attain, Inc., told The News Service of Florida his nonprofit organization has closed four group homes in Orange, Lake and Seminole counties over the past year and has stopped taking referrals because he can’t staff the facilities.

“Basically we’re in survival mode. Right now, our turnover is higher than our recruitment level. So we’re losing staff faster than we’re hiring them,” Cook, whose organization is down to 20 group homes in Central Florida, said in a phone interview.

Attain and other facilities provide residential care and day services to people with intellectual disabilities who often have other complex behavioral issues and can require one-on-one attention. The majority of the group homes, which are overseen by the state Agency for Persons with Disabilities, have four or six beds.

The facilities, which rely largely on Medicaid funding, are paid by the state through a complicated reimbursement schedule based on the types of services residents need.

Clint Bower, president and CEO of MACTown, Inc., said the state’s reimbursement rates for services equate to an average of about $10 an hour for direct-support professionals. “We’re really getting under $10 an hour, and we’re making up the difference because we have to. We have no choice,” Bower, who operates group homes in Miami-Dade and Palm Beach counties and in the Treasure Coast region, told the News Service.

Based on a survey of providers, the Florida Association of Rehabilitation Facilities estimates group homes are paying an average wage of about $11 an hour to direct-support professionals, up from an average $9.50 an hour last year, association CEO Tyler Sununu told the News Service. While wages have increased, reimbursements from the state have not.

“Most of our members are telling me they’re bleeding dry right now by paying their staff more than they can afford, hoping that something will change before they go out of business,” Sununu said.

The association is asking lawmakers, who will begin their annual legislative session in January, to increase reimbursement rates for services to the equivalent of $14 an hour for direct-support employees.

“To be competitive right now we need to be paying $14 or $15 an hour, and that’s what these people are worth. These people work hard. They shouldn’t be making $10 an hour,” Bower said.

Workers with disabilities in California must be paid at least the state’s minimum wage by 2025, under a bill signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom Monday.

Senate Bill 639, by Sen. María Elena Durazo, D-Los Angeles, ends a practice known as 14(c) or sheltered workshops, in which workers with disabilities were paid as little as $2 an hour. The state will join ten other states including Alaska, Oregon and Texas in phasing out the practice.

Supporters of sheltered workshops have said the practice has given jobs to thousands of Californians with disabilities, giving them self-confidence and life skills. Opponents said it led to exploitation of workers and are pushing to end the practice across the nation.

Although the number of those in sheltered workshops has continued to drop, an estimated 10,000 or more California workers were in subminimum wage employment as of 2019, according to a recent report from the Disability Rights California citing the U.S. Department of Labor statistics.

Under the bill, the state can no longer authorize new employers to pay subminimum wages to their workers with disabilities. Those who have already been paying subminimum wages have until Jan. 1, 2025 to increase the pay for their workers.

There’s a condition, however. The State Council on Developmental Disabilities must create a plan detailing how the state can help workers with disabilities get the services and support needed to get jobs that pay them at least minimum wage. If the plan isn’t released by Jan. 1, 2025, employers can continue to pay their workers subminimum wages.

“The whole point of the plan is to do it carefully that it avoids unnecessary harm,” said Andy Imparato, executive director of Disability Rights California which lobbied for the bill. “We certainly want to be careful and make sure those workers have the alternatives when things they are in now are no longer available.”

A 2019 report submitted to the California Department of Developmental Services had found that $1.8 billion in extra state funding is necessary to meet the needs of providers and those with disabilities, including helping them find jobs.

The bill almost failed to get a majority in the Assembly, passing the 80-member house with 45 votes. Some legislators spoke of their own experience raising children with disabilities as why they opposed the bill.

“We’re trying to help them. We’re trying to give them meaning in life and this piece of legislation takes that away from them,” said Assemblyman Devon Mathis, R-Visalia, when the Assembly debated the bill earlier this month.

The National Council on Severe Autism sent a letter to Newsom urging him to veto the bill.

“The State Council on Developmental Disabilities and Senator Durazo must do better than to champion one (high functioning) sector of the disability population while throwing another sector under the bus,” the organization said.

H.R.4761 - A bill to amend the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 to ensure workplace choice and opportunity for young adults with disabilities.

H.R.4762 - A Bill to amend the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 to clarify the definition of competitive integrated employment.

VOR OPPOSES:

H.R.4131 & S.2210 - The Better Care Better Jobs Act - To be clear, we don't oppose this bill. We object to the fact that it excludes the most vulnerable members of the I/DD population.

While the Better Care Better Jobs Act would greatly increase the amount of federal funding for people with I/DD, it only supports those in waiver programs receiving Home and Community Based Services. It unjustly discriminates against those who have chosen Intermediate Care Facilities as the necessary and proper form of residential treatment. By giving a 10% increase n federal matching funds only to HCBS clients, and providing training and increased pay only to direct support professionals working in HCBS facilities, the act deliberately favors one form of treatment over another, one ideology over another, and one set of people with I/DD over another.

H.R. 603 & S. 53 - The Raise the Wage Act - These bills are aimed at raising the minimum wage, but they also have provisions to phase out and ultimately eliminate vocational centers and 14 (c) wage certificates over the next six years and to immediately stop the issuing of any new certificates. VOR believes the issue of employment options for individuals with intellectual disabilities should not be buried in a bill for raising the federal minimum wage. Both issues deserve clean, stand-alone bills.

H.R.1880 - To amend the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 to make permanent the Money Follows the Person Rebalancing Demonstration.

H.R. 2383 - The Transformation to Competitive Integrated Employment Act - this bill purports to assist employers providing employment under special certificates issued under section 14(c) of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 in transforming their business and program models to models that support individuals with disabilities through competitive integrated employment, to phase out the use of these special certificates. We feel that, if enacted, tens of thousands of people with I/DD and autism will still be forced out of opportunities they currently, needlessly, and left without viable alternatives to occupy their time or address their needs and their abilities.

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