Congress returns to Washington, D.C. this week to kick off the June work period. Gun control legislation is expected to be at the forefront of this month's congressional agenda following the recent string of mass shootings, with House Democrats readying floor action on a Judiciary Committee bill that would implement a series of new gun-related reforms and restrictions.

The Achieving Better Life Experience (ABLE) Act of 2014 created tax-free savings accounts for people with disabilities who acquired their disability before the age of 26. The ABLE Age Adjustment Act (S. 331 and H.R. 1219) would change the age of onset criteria from age 26 to 46. According to the ABLE National Resource Center, "passage of this legislation would allow an additional 6 million or more people with disabilities [to] become eligible to open an ABLE account. This critical legislation would increase the financial security of people across the spectrum of disabilities without jeopardizing their much-needed public benefits."

ABLE Refresher: The money saved in ABLE accounts can be used to pay for qualified disability-related expenses such as education, housing, employment training, assistive technology, and transportation. An ABLE account is similar to a college savings ("529") account because the earnings in an ABLE account and distributions from the account for qualified disability expenses do not count as taxable income. Also, money saved in an ABLE account will not impact eligibility for Medicaid and other public benefits. ABLE accounts are meant to supplement and do not replace private insurance, Medicaid, or Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits. Before ABLE accounts, most people with disabilities who utilize public benefits did not have a way to save more than $2000. Read more about the ABLE Act and the ABLE Age Adjustment Act. 

Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pension (HELP) and Finance Committees, and House Ways and Means and Energy and Commerce Committees are working to parse together a comprehensive mental health package. Notably, the Senate Finance Committee recently unveiled a bipartisan discussion draft (press release) of tele-mental health legislation as a part of the committee’s broader legislative effort to improve mental health care for Medicare, Medicaid, and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) beneficiaries.

The LIFT the BAR Act (S.4311) was introduced in the U.S. Senate last week by Senators Mazie Hirono (D-HI) and nine original cosponsors: Booker (D-NJ), Brown (D-OH), Gillibrand (D-NY), Leahy (D-VT), Markey (D-MA), Murray, (D-WA), Padilla (D-CA), Sanders (D-VT) and Warren (D-MA). You can read Protecting Immigrant Families' official statement about it here. This legislation aims to lift the “five-year bar"--a 1996 policy that denies eligibility for federal assistance programs to millions of immigrant families who are lawfully present in the United States. The Hirono bill is the Senate companion to legislation (HR 5227) sponsored by Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal (D-Washington-7), which has earned more than 80 cosponsors since its introduction in September.

A sign-on letter of support of more than 750 national, state, and local organizations was delivered to Congress last week. Additional one-pagers and resources are available here: LTBA Resources and LTBA Partner Tool Kit.

On the final day of Mental Health Awareness Month, the Biden Administration released this FACT SHEET that outlines its plan to address mental health concerns in the U.S. through three pillars:

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), notified states that they now have an additional year — through March 31, 2025 — to use funding made available by the American Rescue Plan (ARP) to enhance, expand, and strengthen home- and community-based services (HCBS) for people with Medicaid who need long-term services and supports.

As the primary funder of HCBS nationally, Medicaid plays a critical role in supporting states’ efforts to strengthen these services for their beneficiaries. Section 9817 of the American Rescue Plan provides states with a temporary 10 percentage point increase to the federal medical assistance percentage (FMAP) for certain Medicaid expenditures for HCBS — an estimated $12.7 billion. As a result of the ARP increase in the federal matching rate on activities, states originally had a three-year period — from April 1, 2021, through March 31, 2024 — to use the available state funds, attributable to the ARP’s increased FMAP, on activities to enhance, expand, or strengthen HCBS in Medicaid. The extended timeframe of an additional year will help to facilitate high-quality, cost-effective, person-centered services for people with Medicaid.

Resources:

In May, CMS published a final rule on reassignment of Medicaid provider claims. The rule includes provisions that will help direct care workers who provide home and community-based services (HCBS) get important benefits like health insurance and job training. By helping to address one of the key causes of the severe shortage of direct care workers, this rule will help improve and stabilize the workforce, which is critical to improving the quality and availability of services for older adults and people with disabilities. The rule also will help to level the playing field between agency-employed workers and independent practitioners.

The aging and disability network works with a number of these individual practitioners and can help spread the word among workers and states to ensure all direct care workers have access to important employee benefits. Read more.

To be considered as a reviewer, please create an account and upload a copy of your CV or resume to the Reviewer Recruitment Module (RRM) in Grants Solutions.

Below are specific opportunities for people with disabilities to serve as reviewers this summer. Please follow the above steps to create your RRM account and then reach out to the respective contact if you are:

The Administration for Children and Families recently announced that receiving Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP (sometimes called “food stamps”) meets the definition of “public assistance” for the purposes of determining eligibility for Head Start services. This means that if a family receives SNAP, they automatically qualify for Head Start.

With programs for infants, toddlers, and preschoolers, Head Start helps children from low-income families – including children with disabilities – get ready for school. SNAP supplements food budgets for low-income families, with special eligibility rules for families that include an older person or a person with disabilities.

CMS recently updated the portions of its COVID-19 vaccine toolkit for Medicaid, the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), and the Basic Health Program. The toolkit, which is updated as new information is available, is intended to help policymakers identify and address issues relating to vaccine coverage and reimbursement for people enrolled in Medicaid, CHIP, and the Basic Health Program. On May 5 and May 6, CMS published updates to the following sections of the toolkit:

ACL has released a new brief, Leveraging Innovation, Collaboration, and Data with Assistive Technology to Reduce Social Isolation and Loneliness: Success Story from Illinois. This brief highlights a model and innovative partnership at both the federal and state levels that successfully purchased and distributed technology devices to older adults and people with disabilities served by local agencies in order to reduce social isolation and loneliness.

Multiple entities worked together to lead the Illinois CARE Connections (ICC) program effort including the Illinois Assistive Technology Program (IATP), Illinois Department on Aging (IDoA), and Illinois Department of Human Services (IDHS). From the federal end, this partnership was made possible through funds from Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act funding and support from ACL's Assistive Technology program, Aging and Disability Resource Centers (ADRCs), No Wrong Door (NWD) system, and Older Americans Act programs. This partnership effort is significant because Assistive Technology Act funds cannot be used to directly purchase technology for consumers.

National Association of Medicaid Directors (NAMD) and the American Public Human Services Association (APHSA) are co-authors of the blog post, Congress Must Act to Help States Realign Medicaid and SNAP Renewals. They explore how SNAP and Medicaid renewal dates have become misaligned during the COVID-19 public health emergency, and call on Congress to allow states to realign these renewals.

Medicaid directors in California, Iowa, and North Carolina talked about the upcoming unwinding of the public health emergency’s (PHE) continuous coverage requirement in the NAMD partner webinar on May 24th, 2022.

This blog post from Community Catalyst highlights some strategies used by La Unión del Pueblo Entero (LUPE), an organization that serves immigrant and Hispanic families throughout the Rio Grande Valley in Texas.

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Family Voices is a national organization and grassroots network of families and friends of children and youth with special health care needs and disabilities that promotes partnership with families--including those of cultural, linguistic and geographic diversity--in order to improve healthcare services and policies for children.