The Department of Human Services (DHS) Office of Long-Term Living (OLTL) has announced the launch of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARPA) Funding Reporting portal. The online portal will be available on September 30, 2022, for OLTL providers to submit costs associated with ARPA funding distributed in 2021 in order to comply with DHS reporting requirements.

Background: ARPA Funding Information 

In 2021, federal funding from ARPA was allocated by the General Assembly under Act 24 and enacted by Governor Wolf to provide funding to nursing facilities (NF), personal care homes (PCH), and assisted living residences (ALR). These ARPA funds should be used for COVID-19 relief for costs not otherwise reimbursed by federal, state, or other sources of funding.

In addition, ARPA provided a temporary 10 percent increase to the federal medical assistance percentage (FMAP) for certain Medicaid expenditures for home and community-based services (HCBS). The funding must be used to enhance, expand, or strengthen HCBS. OLTL outlined in its plan to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) initiatives to strengthen the workforce and assist Adult Day Services (ADS) providers. The OLTL ARPA plan directed funding to Personal Assistance Service (PAS), Community Integration (CI), and Residential Habilitation (Res Hab) providers to assist with recruitment and retention of direct care workers. The plan also directed additional funding to providers to strengthen ADS.

ARPA funding must be used for things such as sign-on bonuses, retention payments, COVID-19 related leave benefits and paid time off, vaccination incentives, and/or the purchase of personal protective equipment and testing supplies. Additionally, ADS providers can use the funding for retrofitting adult daily living centers, expenses to re-open the centers, and expenses to develop alternative models to provide ADS.

Additional detailed information about the distribution of the 2021 ARPA funding can be found on the DHS Long-Term Care Providers web page.

ARPA Funding Reporting Portal
Effective September 30, 2022, providers can access the portal and begin to report ARPA 2021 costs. Providers can access the portal through the Funding Portal Login web page. The first report due date will be November 30, 2022, and should reflect two reporting periods. Providers are required to submit reports in the portal on a bi-annual basis thereafter according to their exhaustion of the funds. Please reference the chart below.

Providers must keep all documentation related to the costs reported in the final cost report for a minimum of five years.