RI APSE To Host Session On Supported Employment Successes; State To Present First Look at DD Rate Review

(This article was updated Sept. 29 to include details for accessing two online rate review sessions. )

Rhode Islanders with developmental disabilities who have received supported employment services over the last six years, their families and the professionals who support them are invited to share their experiences Sept. 29 in an online “community conversation” intended to help shape job-related supports in the future.

The Rhode Island Chapter of the Association of People Supporting Employment First (RI APSE) will host the meeting with the aim of highlighting the successful strategies of pilot programs funded by the Division of Developmental Disabilities (DDD) over the last six years in the hope of informing the next wave of job-related services.

The session has the support of a federal court monitor who seeks to promote compliance with a 2014 consent decree requiring the state to help find competitive employment in the community for adults with developmental disabilities.

The meeting, at noon on Thursday, will be facilitated by Jeannine Pavlak, a board member of the Massachusetts Chapter of APSE who has 32 years’ experience providing supported employment services to people with disabilities.

Pre-registration is required for the session. To pre-register, click here.

Reminder: DD Rate Review Recommendations To Be Aired

Meanwhile, on Sept. 28 and Sept. 29, consultants will make two presentations of preliminary recommendations for new reimbursement rates for private providers of developmental disability services that are intended to help the state comply with the consent decree. No pre-registration is required for these online sessions.

The first, with technical details aimed at providers, is on Sept. 28 from 12:30 to 3 p.m. To join, click here. Update: There is a meeting passcode and it is 186251, according to a BHDDH spokesman.

The second, for consumers, families and the community, is Sept. 29 from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m. To join, click here. (The link allows listeners to join using internet audio and also gives two other options for access. )

Interested stakeholders will have until October 21, 2022 to submit comments. Recordings, materials, and instructions for submitting comments will be posted after September 29 on the website of the Department of Behavioral Healthcare, Developmental Disabilities and Hospitals. To go there, click https://bhddh.ri.gov/developmental-disabilities/initiatives/rateand-payment-methodology-review-project.

RI's Olmstead Consent Decree Coordinator Moves On

By Gina Macris

Aryana Huskey, Rhode Island’s latest  statewide coordinator for implementing the 2014 Olmstead consent decree, has stepped down after 14 months to accept a job with the Healthcare Workforce Management Initiative run by the state’s Executive Office of Health and Human Services. 

She is the sixth person in eight years to work as consent decree coordinator, a position created at the request of an independent federal court monitor to unify the state’s response to the consent decree.

Responsibility for implementing the decree is spread across several departments of state government, while the General Assembly holds the purse strings.

In the last two years, legal proceedings in the case have made it clear that a community-based service system required by the consent decree cannot become reality without significant additional funding and legislative change to certain administrative practices. Only two years remain for the state to fully comply with the consent decree.

Huskey, who worked out of the state Executive Office of Health and Human Services (EOHHS), made the announcement in an email to the “DD Provider Community” on Friday, May 27, her last day as consent decree coordinator.  

EOHHS did not have any immediate announcement about plans to hire another consent decree coordinator or say who might serve as interim coordinator.  

In addition to EOHHS, responsibility for implementing the consent decree is spread across the Department of Behavioral Healthcare, Developmental Disabilities and Hospitals (BHDDH), the Department of Human Services, the Department of Education, and the Department of Labor and Training.  

BHDDH delegates the day-to-day work of carrying out the changes mandated by the consent decree to private agencies it licenses to care for adults with developmental disabilities.  

The consent decree draws its authority from the Olmstead decision of the U.S. Supreme Court, which says people with disabilities have the right to receive services in the least restrictive environment that is therapeutically appropriate. That environment is presumed to be the community, the high court said.

For more background on the position of consent decree coordinator, click here.

$15 M for RI DD Reform Planned In Next Budget

By Gina Macris

Rhode Island Governor Daniel McKee unveiled a budget plan March 11 that includes $15 million for structural reforms to services for adults with developmental disabilities in the next fiscal year.

Overall, McKee’s has proposed an $11.17 billion budget for Fiscal 2022 which promises to resolve a statewide $336 million deficit while protecting those hardest-hit by the pandemic and helping small business. McKee said the budget “protects Rhode Islanders through an unprecedented public health crisis and lays the foundation for a durable recovery.”

At a noontime virtual briefing for reporters, A. Kathryn Power, director of the state Department of Behavioral Healthcare, Developmental Disabilities, and Hospitals, said $10 million of the developmental disabilities reform effort will come from state revenue and another $5 million will be funded by the federal government.

She said BHDDH wants to create a “stronger provider community that is fiscally sustainable.” The reform efforts will increase opportunities for employment and other services for adults with developmental disabilities, she said.

Chief Judge John J. MCConnell, Jr. of the U.S. District Court has ordered the state to develop a three-year plan for overhauling privately-run services comply with a 21014 consent decree which requires Rhode Island to integrate adults with developmental disabilities in their communities in accordance with the Americans With Disabilities Act.

The developmental disabilities budget contains a separate $4.5 million allocation for “alternative placements” for adults with developmental disabilities who live in a state-run group home system called Rhode Island Community Living and Supports.

A ten-percent increase for shared living caregivers also will be in the budget, as part of another group of expenditures intended to encourage more home and community-based services as an alternative to residential care.

Additional information was not immediately available on budget details affecting those with developmental disabilities.