Advocacy

Topics:

Community Integration •  Criminal & Juvenile Justice  • Education  • Employment  • Health Care  • Involuntary Interventions • Legal Capacity

Featured Issue:

Employment. Get the latest on our work advancing opportunities for real work for real wages for people with disabilities, including bills expanding competitive integrated employment and ending subminimum wage for people with disabilities.  More on employment here.

Medicaid:

We know it can be hard to keep up with everything that’s happening so we created a page to give you a few quick facts and updates about the most pressing issues.

To stay up to date visit What We’re Watching and sign up for our email list.

Recent Medicaid Updates:

March 11, 2021

President Biden has signed the latest COVID-19 relief bill, the American Rescue Plan Act, into law. Thanks to your advocacy, the bill includes the dedicated funding for home and community-based services (HCBS) that we have been fighting for since the beginning of the pandemic, along with other important disability priorities. HCBS funding is critical to help individuals with disabilities and older adults remain safely in their home rather than being forced into nursing homes and other congregate settings that have faced severe COVID-19 outbreaks.

For more on what disability priorities are and are not included in the American Rescue Plan Act, check out our fact sheet. More on the bill is also available on our COVID-19 legislation page.

March 10, 2021

Today, Congress passed the American Rescue Plan Act, which President Biden is expected to sign into law shortly. Thanks to your advocacy, the bill includes the dedicated funding for home and community-based services (HCBS) that we have been fighting for since the beginning of the pandemic, along with other important disability priorities. HCBS funding is critical to help individuals with disabilities and older adults remain safely in their home rather than being forced into nursing homes and other congregate settings that are often the center of COVID-19 outbreaks.

For more on what disability priorities are and are not included in the American Rescue Plan Act, check out our fact sheet. More on the bill is also available on our COVID-19 legislation page.

March 3, 2021

Over the weekend the House passed a new coronavirus relief bill, the American Rescue Plan Act. The bill includes the dedicated funding for Medicaid home and community-based services (HCBS) that the disability community has been fighting for since the start of the pandemic. It has now headed to the Senate and we need to make sure this critical funding remains in the bill. 

Please take a moment now to contact your Senators! It’s important that they hear from us about why this funding matters! We have set up a portal you can use to email them directly here. More information about contacting your Senators is also available on our advocacy page. 

For more on what disability priorities are and are not included in the American Rescue Plan Act, check out our fact sheet. You can find more information on passed and proposed COVID-19 bills on our legislation page. 

Visit the Protect Our Medicaid Site

Advocacy Updates

  • May 1, 2023
    CYVYC Expands its National Community of Practice
    The Center on Youth Voice, Youth Choice (CYVYC) is delighted to announce its selection of three additional State Teams to join its national Community of Practice to promote alternatives to guardianship for youth with intellectual and developmental disabilities (I/DD). Nineteen teams from 15 States and the District of Columbia applied. The quality of the applications was excellent and revealed a deep interest in and commitment to Supported Decision-Making and its importance in the lives of transition-aged youth. 
  • February 14, 2023
    CPR Reaches New Settlement to Provide Community Residential Options for Class Members at New Hampshire’s State Nursing Facility
    After months of negotiation, CPR and its partners, the Disability Rights Center (DRC) and the Department of Justice (DOJ), have reached a new settlement agreement to provide community residential alternatives to class members who are institutionalized at the Glencliff Home, New Hampshire’s only publicly-operated nursing facility.  
  • October 11, 2022
    ADA Class Action Seeks to Compel Massachusetts to Stop Unnecessary Institutionalization of People with Disabilities
    Six people with disabilities who are unnecessarily institutionalized in nursing facilities, joined by the Massachusetts Senior Action Council, filed a class action lawsuit today in federal district court in Boston. Their complaint claims that Governor Charlie Baker and other state officials have failed to provide community residential services and supports, and this failure has forced thousands of people with disabilities to live in segregated nursing facilities rather than in the community. The Commonwealth’s failure violates the Americans with Disabilities (ADA) and the Medicaid Act and disproportionately impacts people of color.
  • May 10, 2022
    CPR’s Landmark Case for Persons with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities in New Mexico Ends
    On April 17, 2022, the district court found the State of New Mexico finally achieved compliance with a 2019 settlement agreement and dismissed the case of Jackson v. Los Lunas Community Program.  The class action litigation was originally filed in 1987 on behalf of hundreds of persons with intellectual and developmental disabilities who lived in the state’s two public institutions.
  • February 3, 2022
    CPR’s Director of Supported Decision-Making Initiatives Elected Co-Chair of CCD Rights Task Force
    Morgan Whitlatch, CPR’s new Director of Supported Decision-Making Initiatives, has been elected as co-chair of the Rights Task Force of the Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities (soon to be renamed “Consortium for Constituents with Disabilities”) (CCD).  CCD is the largest coalition of national organizations working together to advocate for federal public policy that ensures the self-determination, independence, empowerment, integration, and inclusion of people with disabilities in all aspects of society. 

View All Advocacy Updates