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ODP Announcement 21-044 provides instructions to residential provider agencies who do not anticipate being able to meet the current June 30, 2021 deadline for Health Risk Screening Tool (HRST) screens for individuals receiving residential services.

As of June 30, 2021 — the date that ODP established as the extended deadline for completion of the initial Health Risk Screening Tool (HRST) screens for individuals receiving residential services — draws near, ODP recognizes that some providers may having difficulty meeting this timeline. Providers who will not complete all required screenings by June 30, 2021, should contact the Regional Program Office and convey to the Regional Program Manager (RPM) the agency’s current plan to complete the required HRSTs, including the date by which these screens will be completed.

Providers with locations in more than one ODP Region should contact the RPM associated with your assigned Administrative Entity responsible for completing provider qualifications.

Though providers will determine the order in which the remaining HRSTs will be completed, ODP has the following recommendations to help providers ensure that the health and safety needs of the individual are being met:

  • New admissions should be screened as soon as possible following admission once the individual is accessible in the HRST database.
  • Individuals should have an HRST completed within 14 days of any of the following situations:
    • Hospitalization;
    • Injury or illness resulting in treatment beyond first aid;
    • Medication ordered for a new diagnosis;
    • Change in current physical condition or behaviors resulting in increases in the acuity of the service needs;
    • Prescribed change in diet;
    • Choking episode;
    • Unexplained weight loss or gain;
    • New onset of or change in seizure activity;
    • Fecal impaction;
    • Pressure ulcers;
    • Dehydration;
    • New onset or unstable diabetes; and
    • Individual is unable to or declines to follow physician orders for treatment, medication, or other intervention.

As noted in the Pennsylvania Health Risk Screening Tool Protocol Update, each residential provider will identify staff from within the provider organization who will become the trained HRST rater(s). The initial and subsequent HRST screenings must be completed by a trained rater who has completed the HRST online rater training. Assistance with access to the HRST online rater training can be obtained by contacting this email.

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Wednesday, June 9, at 3:00 pm ET

Register for the webinar

Nicole T. Jorwic, JD, Senior Director of Public Policy at The Arc and an expert on the topic of home- and community-based services (HCBS), will provide an overview of the HCBS program. She will describe how it helps people living with paralysis access the supports and serves they need to live independent lives. Nicole will also discuss how Congress and the administration are aiming to protect, invest in, and modernize this system.

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ODP is reminding providers of the importance to complete the 2020 Staff Stability Survey for your organization. We are particularly interested in having a robust response rate this year due to the impact of the pandemic on your workforce. We expect to use the data from this survey to help inform the rate-setting work.

If you are one of the 120 or so who have already completed the survey or determined that your agency is not eligible to complete, thank you, and there is nothing further to do. While we are well on our way to a statistically significant response, over half of our providers have not yet clicked on the survey to open it.

Responses are due by June 30. You should have received an invitation and the personalized survey link from staffstability@hsri.org. Please be sure to check your spam folder or contact Rick Smith if you cannot locate the message. Thank you for your attention to this important survey.

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ODP Announcement 21-043 addresses several frequently asked questions regarding the Incident Management Bulletin. With the March 1, 2021 release of the Incident Management (IM) Bulletin 00-21-02, the Office of Developmental Programs (ODP) has received multiple questions from stakeholders through email, conversations, dialogue during trainings, and phone calls. This FAQ was developed to answer some of the questions received. Please note: ODP expects stakeholders who have the responsibility of implementing IM processes to use this time to get familiar with the Incident Management Bulletin, as the effective date is approaching on Thursday, July 1, 2021.

Please visit the ODP web page that includes the IM Bulletin, information, and training. This FAQ does not contain all questions received; ODP chose questions that were asked frequently by multiple stakeholders. ODP expects to continue to receive questions based on the IM Bulletin; therefore, this document will be updated on a routine basis. Stakeholders will be notified when there are additions added to this FAQ.

For questions, please contact your ODP Regional Office or send them to ODP’s Incident Management Team.

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ODP Announcement 21-042 informs stakeholders that the following resources are now available to support the Incident Management Bulletin (effective July 1, 2021) and alignment with the Chapter 6100 regulations:

  • Web-based trainings are now available to highlight EIM system enhancements that will be implemented on Thursday, July 1, 2021.
  • Registration for Question and Answer sessions (Q&A) related to training are now open and available on the Home and Community Services Information System (HCSIS) Learning Management System (LMS).

Webcasts are now available on the LMS. Stakeholders that perform functions in EIM are encouraged to view these self-paced trainings.

In addition, the Office of Developmental Programs (ODP) will facilitate Q&A sessions beginning on Friday, June 4, 2021. Sessions will focus on specific incident management documents in EIM. Registration is required for the Q&A sessions and will be available through LMS beginning May 28.

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The Managed Long-Term Services and Supports (MLTSS) Subcommittee meeting was held on Wednesday, June 2, 2021. The primary agenda topics at the meeting included a summary of the follow-up from the COVID-19 listening session feedback, which was presented by Deputy Secretary of the Office of Long-Term Living (OLTL) Jamie Buchenauer, and the 2020 Home and Community-Based Services (HCBS) Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS) Areas for Improvement Plans from the three Community HealthChoices (CHC) Managed Care Organizations (MCOs). The following handouts were shared during the meeting:

The next MLTSS Subcommittee meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, July 7, 2021.

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Capitolwire: After May’s $1.6 Billion Tax Revenue Collection Overage, PA is Sitting at $2.9 Billion in Excess Revenue With One Month to Go in the Current Fiscal Year

By Chris Comisac, Bureau Chief, Capitolwire

HARRISBURG (June 2) — Less than a week after the state’s Independent Fiscal Office forecast Pennsylvania would end its current fiscal year with a $3.16 billion revenue surplus, the state Department of Revenue announced the commonwealth is well on its way to reaching that mark.

General Fund revenue collections for the month of May came in far stronger than originally estimated – totaling $3.9 billion, which was $1.6 billion, or 65.4 percent, ahead of expectations – mostly due to a one-month delay of the collection deadline for personal income taxes (PIT), pushing the state’s year-to-date collections to $2.9 billion, or 8.5 percent, above estimate with one more month of collections to go.

“We are also nearly $2.9 billion above our estimate for the fiscal year as of today,” said Revenue Secretary Dan Hassell on Tuesday in a press release announcing May’s General Fund Revenue collections. “This is very positive news with one month to go in the current fiscal year.”

Last week, the IFO updated its revenue forecast for the current fiscal year, FY2020-21, indicating the state’s General Fund would end the year with $1.674 billion more than the agency had estimated in January, pushing the estimated General Fund total, once June’s collections are in, to $40.111 billion, which is $3.16 billion more than was expected when the budget was finalized in November. The IFO’s report also included the agency’s initial revenue estimate for the coming fiscal year,FY2021-22, with that figure being over $2.1 billion less than what the state is expected to collect during the current fiscal year.

PIT collections totaled $1.9 billion last month, which was $1 billion, or 111 percent, more than anticipated, due to the tax filing deadline extension until May 17, more than making up for the $571.8 million shortfall experienced in April by the PIT because of the deadline extension. Through 11 months of the fiscal year, the PIT has collected $14.9 billion, which is $747.7 million, or 5.3 percent, above estimate.

While May’s revenue collection results were mostly due to the PIT, the PIT wasn’t the only revenue source performing above expectations, with those performances in most cases directly tied to the billions in federal dollars pumped into the state as part of the various COVID-19 stimulus initiatives during the past year. The IFO last week indicated there have been nearly $78 billion in direct federal payments to individual Pennsylvanians (by way of unemployment benefits and stimulus checks) during Calendar Years 2020 and 2021, along with another nearly $79 billion in federal support to businesses, as well as the state government and the commonwealth’s local levels of governments.

Revenue collections from the state’s Sales and Use Tax (SUT) continued their strong performance over the past several months, with the tax – helped by heightened consumer demand due to both additional federal dollars in people’s pockets as well as the COVID-19 virus in decided retreat prompting more people to get out and engage in economic activity – producing $1.2 billion in May, a total that was $211.8 million, or 22 percent, above estimate. Year-to-date SUT collections total $11.6 billion, which is $741.7 million, or 6.8 percent, ahead of expectations.

May corporation tax revenue collections were $163.7 million, or 61.4 percent, more than anticipated, producing a monthly total of $430.1 million, of which $417.5 million came from the state’s Corporate Net Income Tax (CNIT). For the year thus far, corporation taxes have generated $5.6 billion, which is $892.2 million, or 18.9 percent, above estimate.

An unfortunate side-effect of the past year of COVID-19 and the deaths the virus has caused has been a boost in the revenue generated by the state’s inheritance tax. In May, the tax’s collections were $136 million, which was $53.5 million, or 64.8 percent, above estimate, pushing total collections for the last 11 months of the fiscal year to $1.2 billion, which is $216.5 million, or 21.1 percent, above estimate.

The real estate market has been on fire in most areas of the nation, and Pennsylvania has been no exception. In May, the realty transfer tax produced $56.9 million in revenue, which was $14.8 million, or 35.1 percent, above estimate. Year-to-date, the tax has brought it $575.1 million, which is $95.5 million, or 19.9 percent, ahead of expectations.

The state’s “sin taxes” – including cigarette, malt beverage, liquor and gaming taxes – also continued to perform well in May, totaling $191 million in revenue, which was $24.5 million, or 14.7 percent, above estimate, pushing the fiscal-year revenue total to $1.6 billion, which is $132.3 million, or 9.1 percent, more than anticipated.

Non-tax revenue was likewise above estimate last month, by a total of $45.6 million, or a whopping 377 percent, which the IFO attributed to higher-than-expected license and fee collections, as well as other miscellaneous collections. May’s $57.7 million in collections brings the year-to-date total to $1.1 billion, which is $42.8 million, or 4 percent, above estimate.

June begins what most hope will be the homestretch toward a finalized budget for FY2021-22, though reports emanating from the state Capitol suggest there are several areas of disagreement between Democrat Gov. Tom Wolf and the Republican-controlled General Assembly, including issues related to proposed tax and spending hikes (as well as the redirection of existing education and other spending), and the appropriation of the more than $7 billion in federal COVID-19 stimulus/relief funding distributed to Pennsylvania as part of the last federal stimulus initiative.

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