TO: NDSC Members and Affiliated Parent Groups
FROM: Susan Goodman, Director, Governmental Affairs
DATE: January 18, 2006

Budget Reconciliation Bill Hurts People with Disabilities

Parts of this Alert were adapted from information from the Disability Policy Collaboration and the Association for University Centers on Disability (AUCD.)

Last month Congress narrowly passed a budget bill (known as the budget reconciliation conference report) which cuts almost $40 billion over the next 5 years from Medicaid, the primary funding program for adults and many children with disabilities.

Ironically, the bill has some good sections. A section introduced by Senators Charles Grassley (R-IA), Evan Bayh (D-IN) and Hillary Clinton (D-NY), with the support of the disability community, including NDSC, would:

• establish a new option for states to provide home- and community-based services (HCBS) without needing to use a waiver process;
• allow states to provide any of the services now covered under HCBS waivers; and,
• require states to establish stricter eligibility (level of care) criteria for institutional services than for community-based services.

• cap the number of individuals in the Medicaid program. Right now, everyone who is eligible for Medicaid must receive some basic services, such as health care services.
• Impose new cost sharing provisions on individuals that they must pay or not receive a service.
• offer services in limited areas of the state;
• delay state advocacy efforts to move people out of institutions based on the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Olmstead, which required that waiting lists at least move at a reasonable pace; and