Reports

In 2005 CMS funded a national evaluation by a consortium led by the RAND Corporation to study the implementation and outcomes of ten funded initiatives. These initiatives were meant to improve the recruitment and retention of the Direct Service Community Workforce. Review the report and listen to a recorded webinar where the author's present their findings.

This outcome evaluation, by The Center for Outcome Analysis, Inc., (their website is included), measures whether microenterprise participants and their direct support workers experienced changes in the qualities and quantities of work life. The results found within this study affirm that microenterprise options do offer a viable alternative to “adult day programs” and “sheltered workshops” for citizens with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

Connect-Ability’s goal of enhancing and supporting employment for people with disabilities is informed in large part by the experiences of people with disabilities themselves. The Pathways to Success project collects information on individual experiences, on an ongoing basis through periodic in-person interviews. With this information, the findings will be used to inform not only state agency policy, but also potential employers, so that they may better assist job seekers with disabilities.

In an effort to understand the services and strategies that sustain employment, the state of Washington conducted an evaluation of Washington’s Healthcare for Workers with Disabilities Program. This program is the state’s version of Medicaid Buy-In, and the results show that enrollees are working more hours, earning more money, paying health insurance premiums, contributing more in taxes relying less on food stamps.

The California Community Choices (Choices) project is designed to increase consumer access to home and community-based long-term care services and to provide additional centralized sources of information and referral. The Choices project includes a study to improve the state’s understanding of the financial and structural barriers to increasing consumer access to these services, and to provide recommendations to the state to more effectively manage funding for long-term care.

A series of PHI issue briefs describes the direct-care workforces in several states. Specifically, the briefs focus on Illinois, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Massachusetts, Iowa, Vermont and New York City. Despite growth in this industry, direct-care workers in all states face numerous challenges. In each of the states reviewed by PHI, direct-care jobs do not offer benefits or pay competitive wages. Review the facts and data for each of these states.

This brief summarizes lessons in offering more home and community-based services from states at the forefront of the effort. It describes current options for state Medicaid programs and draws on interviews with state officials to provide details about specific policies and procedures in states.

This brief highlights key strategies to address financing, program administration and community workforce challenges that key experts, federal and state officials and advocates believe must be overcome to expand access to home and community-based services (HCBS). Among the key ideas drawn from a working group discussion at the Foundation are the benefits of providing additional federal financing to states to provide Medicaid HCBS and to administer these benefits.

Developed with aging and transportation professionals in mind, this paper provides an overview of the challenges and opportunities involved in senior transportation. Addressing the need to increase public knowledge about options for older people, promising practices in coordination, cooperation, integration, volunteer programs, financing, and using technology to improve services are addressed. The paper also provides an extensive list of annotated references.

The Medicaid Buy-In program is a key component of the federal effort to make it easier for people with disabilities to work without losing health benefits. This issue brief, the ninth in a series on workers with disabilities, examines the prevalence and characteristics of Medicaid Buy-In participants who leave the program as well as their participation status in other public programs and their employment outcomes after disenrollment.