Major Recent Events
Major Cuts to Disability programs approved by the House; Senate to work on its spending bill next week
On Saturday, the House of Representatives completed work on a FY 2011 Continuing Resolution (CR) that would make landmark cuts to domestic discretionary funding in the remainder of this fiscal year. The cuts to programs were over $100 billion when compared to what President Obama requested for FY 2011. Over 580 amendments were offered during the debate on the bill, with 67 passing that cut an additional $620 million. The overwhelming majority of the cuts were to domestic programs though $19 billion did come from security-related cuts. The Senate is expected to work on a CR when they return from the President’s day recess the week of February 28. The Senate Democratic leadership has signaled an unwillingness to pursue the level of cuts in the House bill but it is unclear what the strategy will be.
While reducing the deficit is important to all Americans, The Arc and UCP will continue work diligently to ensure that this is not done at the expense of the most vulnerable, underserved, and unserved segment of our society. We will be calling on our grassroots in the coming weeks to help preserve the most essential programs for people with disabilities.
Below are some examples of the program cuts in the House bill:
Health Care: Nine amendments were accepted aimed at blocking implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), prohibiting funds to pay the salary of employees or contractors working on implementation and prohibiting the Internal Revenue Service from enforcing the individual responsibilitysection of the ACA.
Employment: The House bill eliminates the State Supported Employment grant program and theProjects with Industry grant program. Also the overall amount of funding to states for employment and training was cut by nearly $1.4 billion.
Housing: Housing for Persons with Disabilities would be cut by 70%. The Section 811 Supportive Housing for Persons with Disabilities program budget would be cut from the FY 2010 level of $300 million to $90 million for FY 2011.
Special Education: The House bill would cut funding to states for special education by $557 million. Representative Cathy McMorris-Rodgers introduced an amendment which passed by a vote of 249 to 179. The amendment would restore the $557 million to special education by taking that amount from regular education. Several advocacy groups, including the Council for Exceptional Children, had opposed the amendment stating that it “robbed Peter to pay Paul.”
Social Security: The Administration’s “Limitation on Administrative Expenses,” the amount the agency spends on salaries and other costs to administer its programs, would be funded at $10.675 billion. This is $1.7 billion less than the President’s request for FY 2011 and will result in increased backlogs in disability cases. In anticipation of the possibility of this reduced spending level, SSA has imposed a hiring freeze and is planning for the possibility of furloughs.
Transportation: The biggest cut to transportation was to the high speed rail program, a priority of the Obama Administration. Amtrak was cut an additional $151 million.
Special Olympics: All funding would be eliminated.
FY 2012 Appropriations – President releases Budget Request; Disability programs slated for both significant cuts and increases
The Obama Administration released its budget request for FY 2012 on February 14th. It included a five-year freeze on domestic discretionary spending, saving an estimated $400 billion over 10 years. Within the overall freeze, some programs were viewed as investments and given an increase, others faced significant cuts, and many programs were proposed to be consolidated with other programs. The White House budget would reduce overall spending by 2.7 percent from the $3.8 trillion Obama proposed a year ago for fiscal 2011.
Below is a summary of changes to disability-related programs in the President's Budget:
Health: The Administration proposes cutting $62 billion from federal health spending to offset the cost of a two-year delay in reducing payments to physicians who treat Medicare patients.
Employment: As has been proposed in previous budgets, the Supported Employment State Grant program, Projects with Industry and a few other smaller programs were proposed to be consolidated with the state grant. There were also a few proposals for new spending including:
• targeted program for youth receiving SSI ($30 million)
• Mentoring program for individuals with intellectual disabilities ($5 million)
• National activities to improve VR ($8 million)
Social Security: The President has requested $12.522 billion for the Social Security Administration’s administrative expenses, an amount that Commissioner Michael Astrue indicates is “the minimum the agency needs to continue to reduce key backlogs and to increase deficit-reducing program integrity work.” In addition, the request includes proposals to establish:
• Disability Research Consortium – to enhance recent efforts to expand disability research. ($5 million)
• SSI Children’s Pilot – an interagency pilot – Promoting Readiness of Minors in SSI (PROMISE) – to improve outcomes for children in the SSI program. Funding will provide competitive grants to test and evaluate interventions that successfully improve child and family outcomes and result in children leaving the SSI program. ($10 million)
• Disability Insurance /Work Incentives Simplification Pilot (WISP) – a legislative proposal to reauthorize SSA’s demonstration authority for 5 years, including its ability to test various methods of treating work activity of people receiving disability benefits. Using that authority, WISP would test important improvements of return-to-work rules by simplifying treatment of beneficiaries’ earnings and potentially reducing overpayments.
Developmental Disabilities Act: The DD grant programs would remain level funded; however the funding for Projects of National Significance would be cut to $8 million from $14 million, a cut of $6 million.
Discrimination: $18 million would be added to EEOC’s budget for enforcement of the non-discrimination in employment provisions of the ADA. Funding for the Helping America Vote (HAVA) protection and advocacy voting project would be eliminated.
Special Education: The Department of Education would receive a $200 million increase for special education and $50 million for programs for infants and toddlers.
Special Olympics: The President’s Budget would provide level funding of $8 million.
Housing: The President’s Budget calls for $196 million for the Section 811 Housing for Persons with Disabilities Program, a cut of 35% from FY 2010. It would move Section 811 rental assistance vouchers to the Section 8 voucher program, freeing Section 811 dollars up for creating new accessible housing. Under the new Frank Melville Housing program, housing developers would be able to leverage the Section 811 dollars in more efficient ways. The anticipated number of accessible housing units would be 3-4,000 compared with the 1,000 new units annually under the current system.
Respite. The President’s Budget calls for $10 million for the Lifespan Respite program which is a 400% increase over the current funding level ($2.5 million). It also provides $192 million for the Family Caregiver Support program which is 500% increase over the FY2010 level ($38 million).
New Programs: The Department of Education would receive $5 million to create a Mentoring for Individuals with Intellectual Disabilities; NIDRR would receive an additional $10 million to investigate cloud computing for making computer technology accessible; and several departments would jointly receive $30 million to create a transition program called PROMISE for youth who receive SSI benefits.
Long Term Services and Supports – HHS announces MFP funding for states and seeks public comment on CFC regulations
States will see significant new federal support in their efforts to help move Medicaid beneficiaries out of institutions and into their own homes or other community settings, Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced yesterday. The Affordable Care Act provides additional funding for two programs supporting that goal:
Money Follows the Person (MFP): The Affordable Care Act (ACA) extended the MFP demonstration program (which was set to expire in fiscal year 2011) for an additional five years. The 13 States receiving awards today (CO, FL, ID, ME, MA, MN, MS, NV, NM, RI, TN, VT, and WV) join the 29 States and the District of Columbia already operating MFP programs. Together, these States will receive more than $45 million in the first year of the awards, and more than $621 million through 2016. The MFP program provides individuals living in a nursing home or other institution new opportunities to live in the community with the services and supports they need.
Community First Choice (CFC) Option: The ACA created the CFC Option, which will give States additional resources to make community living a first choice, and leave nursing homes and institutions as a fall back option. Starting in October, this option will allow States to receive a six percent increase in federal matching funds for providing community-based attendant services and supports to people with Medicaid. Over the next three years—through 2014—States could see a total of $3.7 billion in new funds to provide these services. The CFC proposed rule, posted today, describes the details of this program and solicits public comment. See the HHS press release at:
http://www.hhs.gov/news/press/
Employment - Three Transition Bills Introduced in House
Three separate bills that share the name, “Transitioning towards Excellence & Achievement in Mobility (TEAM)” have been introduced in Congress by Rep. Greg Harper (R-MS). The TEAM legislation provides separate legislative responses to help ensure that youth with significant disabilities have the opportunity to become gainfully employed in integrated settings, pursue post-secondary education, and engage in typical community activities upon leaving high school.
The TEAM Education Act (H.R. 602) seeks to streamline the transition process at the high-school level and require coordination between the state education authority and the State I/DD authority. Among other things, it requires Individualized Education Plans (IEPs) to begin including transition planning at age 14, and allows the State Intellectual/Developmental Disability (I/DD) Agency to participate in the IEP and transition planning team for students expected to be eligible for adult I/DD services. It also provides $50 million to Local Educational Agencies (LEAs) to pilot the hiring of internal transition services coordinators
The TEAM Empowerment Act (H.R. 603) seeks to increase coordination between state educational agencies and state I/DD authorities to successfully transition youth with significant disabilities from high school into meaningful employment and post-secondary education opportunities. The bill establishes an optional Transition Planning and Services Division within each State I/DD agency to provide the necessary capacity and expertise. It also provides $50,000,000 in funding beginning in fiscal year 2012.
The TEAM-Employment Act (H.R. 604) would amend the Rehabilitation Act to realign preferred outcomes for individuals with significant disabilities, and streamlines public funding by requiring the Vocational Rehabilitation (VR) systems to actively engage with other state entities. The bill institutes the attainment of integrated employment or post-secondary education as the preferred outcome for all individuals, including those with significant disabilities. It directs VR programs to work toward ensuring that all individuals with disabilities can be employed in integrated settings at the greater of minimum or competitive wages with commensurate benefits, and can pursue independent living and community participation and removing VR authority to determine an adult with significant disabilities ineligible to receive supported employment services.
While reducing the deficit is important to all Americans, The Arc and UCP will continue work diligently to ensure that this is not done at the expense of the most vulnerable, underserved, and unserved segment of our society. We will be calling on our grassroots in the coming weeks to help preserve the most essential programs for people with disabilities.
Below are some examples of the program cuts in the House bill:
Health Care: Nine amendments were accepted aimed at blocking implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), prohibiting funds to pay the salary of employees or contractors working on implementation and prohibiting the Internal Revenue Service from enforcing the individual responsibilitysection of the ACA.
Employment: The House bill eliminates the State Supported Employment grant program and theProjects with Industry grant program. Also the overall amount of funding to states for employment and training was cut by nearly $1.4 billion.
Housing: Housing for Persons with Disabilities would be cut by 70%. The Section 811 Supportive Housing for Persons with Disabilities program budget would be cut from the FY 2010 level of $300 million to $90 million for FY 2011.
Special Education: The House bill would cut funding to states for special education by $557 million. Representative Cathy McMorris-Rodgers introduced an amendment which passed by a vote of 249 to 179. The amendment would restore the $557 million to special education by taking that amount from regular education. Several advocacy groups, including the Council for Exceptional Children, had opposed the amendment stating that it “robbed Peter to pay Paul.”
Social Security: The Administration’s “Limitation on Administrative Expenses,” the amount the agency spends on salaries and other costs to administer its programs, would be funded at $10.675 billion. This is $1.7 billion less than the President’s request for FY 2011 and will result in increased backlogs in disability cases. In anticipation of the possibility of this reduced spending level, SSA has imposed a hiring freeze and is planning for the possibility of furloughs.
Transportation: The biggest cut to transportation was to the high speed rail program, a priority of the Obama Administration. Amtrak was cut an additional $151 million.
Special Olympics: All funding would be eliminated.
FY 2012 Appropriations – President releases Budget Request; Disability programs slated for both significant cuts and increases
The Obama Administration released its budget request for FY 2012 on February 14th. It included a five-year freeze on domestic discretionary spending, saving an estimated $400 billion over 10 years. Within the overall freeze, some programs were viewed as investments and given an increase, others faced significant cuts, and many programs were proposed to be consolidated with other programs. The White House budget would reduce overall spending by 2.7 percent from the $3.8 trillion Obama proposed a year ago for fiscal 2011.
Below is a summary of changes to disability-related programs in the President's Budget:
Health: The Administration proposes cutting $62 billion from federal health spending to offset the cost of a two-year delay in reducing payments to physicians who treat Medicare patients.
Employment: As has been proposed in previous budgets, the Supported Employment State Grant program, Projects with Industry and a few other smaller programs were proposed to be consolidated with the state grant. There were also a few proposals for new spending including:
• targeted program for youth receiving SSI ($30 million)
• Mentoring program for individuals with intellectual disabilities ($5 million)
• National activities to improve VR ($8 million)
Social Security: The President has requested $12.522 billion for the Social Security Administration’s administrative expenses, an amount that Commissioner Michael Astrue indicates is “the minimum the agency needs to continue to reduce key backlogs and to increase deficit-reducing program integrity work.” In addition, the request includes proposals to establish:
• Disability Research Consortium – to enhance recent efforts to expand disability research. ($5 million)
• SSI Children’s Pilot – an interagency pilot – Promoting Readiness of Minors in SSI (PROMISE) – to improve outcomes for children in the SSI program. Funding will provide competitive grants to test and evaluate interventions that successfully improve child and family outcomes and result in children leaving the SSI program. ($10 million)
• Disability Insurance /Work Incentives Simplification Pilot (WISP) – a legislative proposal to reauthorize SSA’s demonstration authority for 5 years, including its ability to test various methods of treating work activity of people receiving disability benefits. Using that authority, WISP would test important improvements of return-to-work rules by simplifying treatment of beneficiaries’ earnings and potentially reducing overpayments.
Developmental Disabilities Act: The DD grant programs would remain level funded; however the funding for Projects of National Significance would be cut to $8 million from $14 million, a cut of $6 million.
Discrimination: $18 million would be added to EEOC’s budget for enforcement of the non-discrimination in employment provisions of the ADA. Funding for the Helping America Vote (HAVA) protection and advocacy voting project would be eliminated.
Special Education: The Department of Education would receive a $200 million increase for special education and $50 million for programs for infants and toddlers.
Special Olympics: The President’s Budget would provide level funding of $8 million.
Housing: The President’s Budget calls for $196 million for the Section 811 Housing for Persons with Disabilities Program, a cut of 35% from FY 2010. It would move Section 811 rental assistance vouchers to the Section 8 voucher program, freeing Section 811 dollars up for creating new accessible housing. Under the new Frank Melville Housing program, housing developers would be able to leverage the Section 811 dollars in more efficient ways. The anticipated number of accessible housing units would be 3-4,000 compared with the 1,000 new units annually under the current system.
Respite. The President’s Budget calls for $10 million for the Lifespan Respite program which is a 400% increase over the current funding level ($2.5 million). It also provides $192 million for the Family Caregiver Support program which is 500% increase over the FY2010 level ($38 million).
New Programs: The Department of Education would receive $5 million to create a Mentoring for Individuals with Intellectual Disabilities; NIDRR would receive an additional $10 million to investigate cloud computing for making computer technology accessible; and several departments would jointly receive $30 million to create a transition program called PROMISE for youth who receive SSI benefits.
Long Term Services and Supports – HHS announces MFP funding for states and seeks public comment on CFC regulations
States will see significant new federal support in their efforts to help move Medicaid beneficiaries out of institutions and into their own homes or other community settings, Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced yesterday. The Affordable Care Act provides additional funding for two programs supporting that goal:
Money Follows the Person (MFP): The Affordable Care Act (ACA) extended the MFP demonstration program (which was set to expire in fiscal year 2011) for an additional five years. The 13 States receiving awards today (CO, FL, ID, ME, MA, MN, MS, NV, NM, RI, TN, VT, and WV) join the 29 States and the District of Columbia already operating MFP programs. Together, these States will receive more than $45 million in the first year of the awards, and more than $621 million through 2016. The MFP program provides individuals living in a nursing home or other institution new opportunities to live in the community with the services and supports they need.
Community First Choice (CFC) Option: The ACA created the CFC Option, which will give States additional resources to make community living a first choice, and leave nursing homes and institutions as a fall back option. Starting in October, this option will allow States to receive a six percent increase in federal matching funds for providing community-based attendant services and supports to people with Medicaid. Over the next three years—through 2014—States could see a total of $3.7 billion in new funds to provide these services. The CFC proposed rule, posted today, describes the details of this program and solicits public comment. See the HHS press release at:
http://www.hhs.gov/news/press/
Employment - Three Transition Bills Introduced in House
Three separate bills that share the name, “Transitioning towards Excellence & Achievement in Mobility (TEAM)” have been introduced in Congress by Rep. Greg Harper (R-MS). The TEAM legislation provides separate legislative responses to help ensure that youth with significant disabilities have the opportunity to become gainfully employed in integrated settings, pursue post-secondary education, and engage in typical community activities upon leaving high school.
The TEAM Education Act (H.R. 602) seeks to streamline the transition process at the high-school level and require coordination between the state education authority and the State I/DD authority. Among other things, it requires Individualized Education Plans (IEPs) to begin including transition planning at age 14, and allows the State Intellectual/Developmental Disability (I/DD) Agency to participate in the IEP and transition planning team for students expected to be eligible for adult I/DD services. It also provides $50 million to Local Educational Agencies (LEAs) to pilot the hiring of internal transition services coordinators
The TEAM Empowerment Act (H.R. 603) seeks to increase coordination between state educational agencies and state I/DD authorities to successfully transition youth with significant disabilities from high school into meaningful employment and post-secondary education opportunities. The bill establishes an optional Transition Planning and Services Division within each State I/DD agency to provide the necessary capacity and expertise. It also provides $50,000,000 in funding beginning in fiscal year 2012.
The TEAM-Employment Act (H.R. 604) would amend the Rehabilitation Act to realign preferred outcomes for individuals with significant disabilities, and streamlines public funding by requiring the Vocational Rehabilitation (VR) systems to actively engage with other state entities. The bill institutes the attainment of integrated employment or post-secondary education as the preferred outcome for all individuals, including those with significant disabilities. It directs VR programs to work toward ensuring that all individuals with disabilities can be employed in integrated settings at the greater of minimum or competitive wages with commensurate benefits, and can pursue independent living and community participation and removing VR authority to determine an adult with significant disabilities ineligible to receive supported employment services.
Wasim Entabi
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