Information and Referral

FCA launched this online community promoting professional knowledge around families in their caregiving role. The site offers resources to help policymakers, professionals and family caregivers develop caregiver-friendly legislation or initiatives, implement caregiver support programs or services, and access information to enhance the delivery of quality care. Interactive site features include an online forum and user submissions.

Making use of data and knowledge sharing to drive benefits outreach, enrollment, and retention efforts promotes the efficient use of limited resources, states a new issue brief from NCOA's National Center for Benefits Outreach & Enrollment. Sharing data also can help enroll eligible individuals in more than one benefits program at a time.

Workforce3 One, an online resource sponsored by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Employment and Training Administration, has a new Disability and Employment Resource Page to provide employment-related resources for the workforce system. This page outlines promising practices and expands the capacity of the One-Stop Career Center system to serve customers disabilities. The resource page includes videos and podcasts, toolkits and training materials, promising practices, and other materials.

Unsure about how to best design and implement HCBS programs? This site provides technical assistance to states that may need assistance in determining which Home & Community Service authority best meet their needs, as well as assisting them in developing, evaluating and maintaing HCBS waiver programs. HCBSselfdirection.org is intended to assist state HCBS program administrators, their staff and contractors, and other state agencies involved with developing HCBS programs.

This site highlights the employment successes of people with Intellectual Disabilities/Developmental Disabilities (ID/DD) who are working in paid jobs in their communities. The purpose of these stories is to share where people work and how they got there. They are meant to be read by individuals with ID/DD, their families, and employment support professionals. The goal is to increase awareness of the full range of employment opportunities and support options available.

The Job Accommodation Network represents the most comprehensive resource for job accommodations available. JAN's mission is to facilitate the employment and retention of workers with disabilities. Their website is designed to make this happen. The site categorizes employers, individuals, and others separately and includes an Accommodation Search and Disabilities Glossary. Hot topics, Publications & Resources, What’s New? and a Website Tour also facilitate the users access to this information.

In April of 2009, WIN conducted this survey, which was sent to over a thousand of its participants. WIN is a free service designed to help people with disabilities understand and use employment programs in Oregon and/or federal work incentives programs. Because it's goal is to help disabled persons navigate the sometimes differing and sometimes conflicting eligibility criteria that discourage individuals from working, this survey is centered around consumer input.

One of the biggest challenges for low-income adults with disabilities who want to work is how to keep health benefits after obtaining employment. WIN is a free service designed to help people with disabilities understand and use employment programs in Oregon and/or federal work incentives programs to obtain, maintain or advance in employment while still meeting critical needs. For this investment, Oregon gets increased tax revenue and decreased reliance on state and federal funded services.

IPAWS is a modernization and integration of the nation’s alert and warning infrastructure. This paper serves to demonstrate how IPAWS addresses the challenges of reaching the whole community, including the 25% of our population who might need assistance. It offers evidence that while IPAWS doesn't solve all of the challenges, it can certainly mitigate them, particularly with greater stakeholder engagement and public awareness. Emerging technologies that could improve accessibility are reviewed.

Massachusetts assesses the service providers it licenses and certifies based on quality of life areas (such as the degree to which consumer choice and control is supported) and organizational outcomes. The reports can be used to understand quality of services and to inform consumers of the array of options available. Agencies are listed alphabetically by region and each report’s executive summary describes services offered.