by Jennifer Tangeman
Changes in state Medicaid regulations could mean the loss of jobs for clients of Peak Community Services.
Peak executive director Don Weikle said the state’s proposed Medicaid waiver funding changes could be detrimental to services for people with developmental disabilities.
The state has proposed putting a 12-month time limit on pre-vocational services and an 18-month limit on supported employment services.
The pre-vocational program, he said, is the organization’s traditional workshop program.
“We have roughly 80 individuals that participate, and of those, just about half would be funded through that mechanism,” Weikle said.
If the state limits funding to one year for the workshops, then those 40 or so people could be out a job.
“There is really no time limit on how long people participate in the workshop now,” Weikle said. “Some people have worked in the workshop for a number of years, because it is not a service that has ever really carried with it a specific time frame.
“As far as I know, no other states impose such a time frame.”
Any person whose workshop service is paid for by Medicaid waiver would lose that funding over the course of the next 12 to 24 months under the proposed regulation.
In the workshop, individuals work through contracts with companies such as Matthew Warren, Tinnerman and Myers Spring.
“They are able to earn a modest amount of income,” Weikle said. “I think, like everyone, you want to find some kind of work that you perceive as meaningful.”
Weikle said Matthew Warren is the workshop’s largest customer, and clients at Peak help put together transmission rings for Chrysler vehicles.
“Not only do they earn money, but they have the personal satisfaction in doing a job and knowing that it is part of something larger,” Weikle said.
John Lendel, vice president and general manager of Matthew Warren, said the company had enjoyed working with Peak Community Services.
“The quality has been excellent,” Lendel said. “They are very, very cooperative and we’ve really never had any issues with them.
“After they are trained, they are very competent workers.”
Lendel described the Peak clientele as “quite capable” and said he had a good working relationship with the staff at Peak.
The other facet of the funding changes is supported employment services. Weikle explained this is the placement of individuals at a workplace in the community with the help of a job coach.
“We send a staff person out to work with the employer to identify a job that a person can do,” the executive director said. “The job coach goes out and learns that job to teach it to the individual to the satisfaction of the employer. The coach stays with that person and gradually fades out over a period of time.”
The proposed rule change would stop funding for a job coach for an individual after 18 months.
Weikle said six to 10 people use a job coach at any given time for initial training, but the coaches are often called back in as job duties change.
“Employers change jobs around more frequently than they used to,” he said. “It used to be an individual could do one job, and day after day essentially do the same thing. Now, employers want people to be able to do different things and that requires longer periods of coaching.”
If a person’s job duties change more than 18 months after they are initially trained, the legislation would prohibit funding for a job coach.
“Chances are the individual will at some point just lose the job,” Weikle said.
If that same individual has already exhausted one year of work in the workshop, he or she would have no employment options.
“The risk is, we will have individuals capable of contributing that will be sitting at home doing nothing,” Weikle said. “That impacts us in a number of ways.”
He explained employers will be out good, hard-working employees and the employees would lose their jobs.
“As with any person, being without a job is very frustrating,” Weikle said. “As any person who has been unemployed knows, it affects how you see yourself, your family life, everything.
“If they cut this off, they will isolate people that have an awful lot to contribute.”
Weikle said groups like the Arc of Indiana and the Indiana Association of Rehabilitation Facilities had developed an alternative proposal that would meet federal requirements and still save the state money. He said 22 states use a similar system and supporters are advocating that system to state officials.
• Jennifer Tangeman is a reporter for the Pharos-Tribune. She can be reached at 574-732-5148 or jennifer.tangeman@pharostribune.com.
