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Intellectual & Developmental Disabilities

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RCPA has partnered with several other ID/A associations to develop a unified budget ask to send to Governor Shapiro. RCPA, The Provider’s Alliance, The Arc of PA, PAR, MAX, and The Alliance sent a letter asking the governor to include $430 million in the 2023/24 state general fund budget proposal to significantly improve the wage rates for the Direct Support Professionals (DSPs) who provide care to individuals with ID/A. This funding, along with its federal match, is crucial because the ID/A system is in crisis. Nearly 60,000 Pennsylvanians with ID/A are at risk of losing or experiencing a reduction of essential services because there are not enough DSPs to care for them. The letter outlines several specific challenges in the ID/A system.

The letter was also sent to Dana Fritz, Chief of Staff; Lindsey Mauldin, Deputy Chief of Staff; The Honorable Uri Monson, Secretary of the Budget; The Honorable Akbar Hossain, Secretary of Policy and Planning; The Honorable Mike Vereb, Secretary of Legislative Affairs; and The Honorable Valerie Arkoosh, Secretary, Department of Human Services.

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Photo by Markus Winkler from Pexels

Step By Step is delighted to announce Lynn Miller has become their Vice President of Business and Program Development.

Eric Lindey, President/CEO of Step By Step shared: “We are thrilled to have Lynn join the Step By Step team! Her work throughout Pennsylvania and the US is well documented and we look forward to developing new services and partnerships with other providers that will continue our mission under Lynn’s direction.”

Lynn most recently served as the national senior justice/WRAP associate and consultant at Advocates for Human Potential. Prior to joining Advocates for Human Potential, Lynn accepted the state’s first position as the Department of Correction’s Mental Health Advocate, where she was responsible for advising the Secretary of Corrections on improvements to the prison’s behavioral health care services, including services for individuals with intellectual disabilities and dually diagnosed individuals. Lynn also served as the Chief of Staff in the Office of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services (OMHSAS).

Lynn has a Bachelor of Science degree in behavioral science and earned her Master of Health Education degree from the Pennsylvania State University. She is also a member of the state’s trauma informed initiative, which is intended to guide the Commonwealth and service providers on what it means to be trauma-informed and healing-centered.

RCPA extends our sincere congratulations to Ms. Miller and we look forward to working with you!

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ODP Announcement 23-009 shares that MyODP’s redesigned navigation structure is now live. Resource pages now reside on MyODP’s home page without the need for a login. MyODP will continue to host all Trainings and role-specific resources that require login.

The website will now be the primary site to access ODP-related resources. Many resource pages that were on MyODP have been consolidated for simpler navigation on the home page and are accessible without the need for login. The home page will also be the main point of access for Everyday Lives content, news, and communications. The home page search bar will search materials on MyODP, ASERT, and AIDinPA.

If you have bookmarks to any resource pages, they will remain accessible until February 28, 2023. Please change your bookmarks to the new resource pages before this date.

Along with this announcement is a Navigation Guide. Please submit feedback through the following MyODP New Navigation Feedback Form.

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Based on feedback that the Office of Developmental Programs (ODP) has received, it has been determined that there is a need for people who are providing Behavioral Support to gather and discuss the service requirements and ODP’s Best Practice Standards, share resources, and develop a network of those providing this critical service.

In 2022, ODP provided this opportunity to Behavioral Specialist Supervisors in their first two cohorts of the Behavioral Support Roundtables. They are looking for more supervisors to participate in the third cohort. If you are willing to be a part of this cohort, they ask that you commit to:

a) Joining ODP virtually for three-hour roundtables once per month for three months (you must be able to attend all 3 sessions in their entirety):

  • February 22 — 9:30 am – 12:30 pm
  • March 29 — 9:30 am – 12:30 pm
  • April 26 — 9:30 am – 12:30 pm

b) Participating during the roundtable with your camera on — ready to share and engage.

If you are interested in participating in this cohort or think you would be interested in future cohorts, please fill out this survey by February 10. ODP will accept providers into the third cohort on a first-come, first-serve basis.

Please know that if you are unable to participate in the above dates or if ODP has closed registration, there will be additional opportunities to join — ODP intends to host cohorts on an ongoing, quarterly basis. Once they have finalized the BSS Roundtable Cohort, they will follow up with additional instructions and information.

Please note that ODP is only able to accept one Behavioral Specialist Supervisor per provider agency. If your organization has multiple supervisors, please choose just one to participate.

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The Rehabilitation Act of 1973, as amended by Title IV of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA), requires State Rehabilitation Councils (SRC) to submit an annual report to the Rehabilitation Services Administration (RSA) and to the Governor of the State on the status of vocational rehabilitation programs operated within the State. The report also provides an excellent resource to learn more about the PaRC.

Read the report here.

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ODP Announcement 23-007 is to inform Providers, Supports Coordinator Organizations (SCOs), and County/Administrative Entities (AEs) that report or manage incidents in the EIM system, including those who are designated as Incident Management Representatives, that enhancements have been made to the EIM system.

On Saturday, January 14, 2023, the Office of Developmental Programs (ODP) released enhancements within the EIM system. With this release, EIM users will benefit from updates that have been made to the system related to medication errors. To facilitate medication error trending and oversight, updates were made to the Medication Error Incident Report and a medication error visual analytic dashboard was created. In addition, a new EIM Medication Error canned report was created to facilitate the use of the Medication Error Dashboard and the analysis of medication errors.

For more specific information related the changes, please reference the HCSIS Release 90.10 Newsletter, pages 25-31.

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