1. ASD Business Plan- A contract was signed with Michael Chapman to work on a business plan that will be presented to the ASD Board. This will hopefully enable the Board to understand what an organization under the ASD umbrella sees as a certified provider of adult services. Theda, Michael and I visited Developmental Disabilities Services Agency in NJ. They are currently instituting a program to provide services to folks with disabilities living at home with their families. This visit provided us with some insight and gave Michael some leads to investigate how others are doing what we hope to do one day.

The plan is due in June. It's possible that the provider agency could be up and running in Jan 07.

 

2. Family Support Waiver. Meetings are in the process to provide the public with info on the Family Support Waiver. This will help all those Medicaid eligible folks receiving DDDS and their families.

 

Thanks to all who attended: Theda Ellis, Craig Shumaker,Dave Graham, Alexis Hackett, Dottie Lund, Marie-Anne Agazadian, Jane Graci, Liz O'Neill, Harold Rowland, Gloria Rybicki

 

1. Brief report given on committees being attended by Karen: Adult Special Populations Task Force . The committee has looked at entrance/exit criteria. Hopes to allow services to be provided to those most in need by reccommending these criteria.

- DDDS Strategic Planning Committee has met w/in the last month to enable the division to know the needs of those they service and put a plan in place to serve folks better.

 

Susan Peterson, Theda and Karen met w/ MA Smith of DDDS along with Roy LaFontaine (Deputy Dir) and others from the Division on the Best Practices Study. The info from the final report was highlighted and recommendations were discussed such as an Office of Autism, ASD as a service provider, doing a small pilot utilizing 2 folks w/ diverse needs and how their services are structured. All of these recommendations were recognized as valuable. The next step is for the ASD board to decide on how the organization will proceed and present that to the Division of DD.

 

2. Open mtgs: to include state and service providers? Grp felt that if agenda items required presence of guests, they would then be asked to join the committee.

 

3. Discussion concerning ASD's future role in adult services. Theda presented 4 items of discussion: Edelsohn Approach, Traditional services - ie, day and residential services, suuport broker and office of autism. The Edelsohn Approach concerns ownership of grp homes as the ARC now does. This did not get support from the grp. ASD as a traditional service provider also seemed like a huge endeavor. As a starting point the grp seemed most interested in support brokerage. A suggestion was made to start with a grp of 4 folks as a pilot. This number would help with capacity. The question arose , "What if there were no services available that were needed?"

 

Theda spoke of Dave Raymond from downstate that develops and supports jobs for a small grp of people. Group was interested in hearing abt his endeavor.

 

Office of Autism: most of the grp felt that this was the state's responsibilty. Karen spoke of committee experience at last Sp Pops Task Force mtg. Karen questioned if Community Services was being scrutinized as Sp Pops is? This would enable state to assess for themselves if CS is able to service the increased number of people w/ autism since many adults w/ autism have been served by Sp Pops in the past. Perhaps this will lead to the state deciding they need a separate "autism office". 

 

Karen asked members to state what needs they would like met by an ASD provider?

-at home supports, respite, recreation, transportation

-work support

-family supports w/ more flexibility

Concensus seemed to be since most grads would not get residential services that ASD could best help by lending supports to families to lessen the high demands of keeping their adult/child at home.