NC Statewide Independent Living Council Meeting Minutes April 25, 2014 Country Inn and Suites, Burlington, NC Welcome/Mission /Minutes The meeting was called to order at 9:05am by Keith Greenarch, Chair. SILC Mission statement: Kay Miley Meeting Accessibility Reminders: Keith Greenarch Introductions were made around the room with our new member Sandra Hicks being recognized. Sandra spoke briefly regarding her background and expectations for serving on the SILC. Absences were explained and/or addressed; Kimlyn Lambert is at a training conference in New Mexico, Mitzi Kincaide is sick, no news regarding Zach Commander or Sandi Sinnott Meeting Agenda: Motion to accept agenda presented by Keith Greenarch Action: (Miley/Ogburn) agenda was unanimously approved. Changes and/or corrections to the Minutes: There were no changes. Action: (McMillan/Bellamy) approval of the minutes was unanimous. Chair Report: Keith Greenarch, Chair I would like to thank Gloria Bellamy the Vice chair for the leading the last meeting and to the SILC staff. My health is much better after dealing with kidney stones and an episode with my heart resulting in the placement of two stints. The Executive Committee has met twice by teleconference, February 24 and March 31. More will be reported on that later. Will, myself and Rene has been working with Deb Cotter from RSA on a SPIL amendment to allocate the cost of living assessment. Rene will talk about that later. Will had his first anniversary working for the SILC. I want to say thank you for your dedication to the SILC and its mission. Sandy and I are in the process of doing Will’s evaluation. Will and I have two centers left to visit. On April 28th we will visit the Shabazz Center; on May 6 we will visit the Charlotte center. After an earlier meeting being cancelled due to weather, we are working to reschedule an appointment with Elizabeth Bishop from DVRS to streamline the reimbursement process. She had indicated that she could help us. When we come to this room and have something to vote on I want to be sure that all members understand what we are voting on. These are important decisions we all need to understand, nothing wrong with asking questions. If you don’t understand ask questions and let’s talk about it. Executive Directors Report: Will Miller, Executive Director Good morning, March 11 was my one year anniversary. There have been ups and downs but I’ve enjoyed every minute of it. I am really glad to have the opportunity to continue to serve in this position. I’ve enjoyed working with each of you and really look forward to the coming year. Does everyone have a copy of my report? This report will give you an idea of what the office is up to and give you the big picture. Feel free to ask any questions you have. Contact me. If there is one thing that I know I got right over the past year, it is hiring Kathleen Boate as our book keeper. I want to make sure everyone knows who she is. She has done a fantastic job. I am also glad to have Sandra Hicks here as our newest council member. Another thing we’ve been working on at the SILC office is the website. Since I’ve started in this position I’ve heard that the website is underutilized. We have heard you and we’ve made improvements. I want to emphasize that this is a work in progress. There is a learning curve here: we are dealing with web editing, which is a technical skill, but Debbie has taken the lead on this. We are figuring out a new system. Once we have it all figured out, I think this will work really well for you guys and for the committees in particular. One of the things we did at the end of the last fiscal year was to contract a website accessibility review. There were a number of issues that were pointed out in the review dealing with access. A lot of the problems were for people, like myself, who are blind or visually-impaired. People who use assistive technology such as a screenreader to access the internet, or someone who has a mobility issue that renders them unable to use a mouse, use keyboard functions to operate a computer. There are things that can be done in the design of a website to make them more accessible for these people. We have done a number of things, some of which you can see and others that you can’t, that will make our website more accessible to anyone who wants to come and view the site. Considering our mission and who we serve I think that’s critical. We’ve added committee pages to make all the committee information available and at your fingertips. Whenever you want to go and look up a document, it should be available to you and the public on our website. From the home page, a new tab at top is Committees. If you use a mouse, you can hover over the link and a list of all SILC committees will appear. If you don’t use a mouse, you can click on the Committees link to go to a webpage that serves as a portal to all the committee pages. You can access information from an All Committees webpage as well as each individual committee page. The All Committees page and each committee page contain a calendar where you can look for the schedule of upcoming committee meetings. A calendar also appears on the homepage. If you have a committee meeting, I would encourage you to open the committee webpage before the meeting starts. There you will be able to view our minutes from the last meeting, any committee reports (such as P&E Reports for the Finance Committee), or any other documents that we want to make available to the committee. So rather than scrambling through your inbox during a meeting to find an attachment to a previous email, we can make documents available and at your fingertips from the website. There are also committee-specific calendars on each of the committee pages. Documents from SILC meetings will be archived on the website. Also, if you come to SILC meetings with a laptop, the idea is that rather than printing out all the documents, you can view them from the website as we discuss them during the meeting. Documents will be posted in both PDF and text formats for accessibility purposes. Once we get the All Committee News page up and running, this page will contain a link to any document that is posted to any of the individual committee pages. Also, you will notice that instead of sending a lot of attachments in the last e-blast, I sent you links to each document on our website. Once the All Committee News page is up and running, I will just send a link to this page where all documents are posted. You can then view, download and print documents as you wish. If anyone ever needs a document in an alternative format, please let the SILC office know and we will provide that to you. We will also post documents in multiple formats on the website so that hopefully people using assistive technology will be able to access and work with them. If you have trouble accessing any of the documents, please let the SILC office know. Also, if you would like us to print out a copy of a document for you, we are happy to do that. If a member or anyone from the public needs access to one of our documents, it is the SILC office’s obligation to accommodate and make it available in an alternate format. Eventually we would like to have the SPIL goals, objectives and activities available from each of the corresponding SPIL goal committee webpages. We will also add a list of members to the pages, so if you don’t remember which of the committees you are on you can find it on the website. Joshua Kaufman: Can the full name of the Goal Committees be listed? This will clarify more than just the Goal number. It will help me and others who are learning about the SILC to get a better understanding. Will Miller: Absolutely, that’s a good idea. Thank you, and the website is a work in progress, so if there are other comments or suggestions please bring them to the SILC office attention. Any other comments or questions? Thanks you guys. Thank you for the past year, and I am really looking forward to working with you in the future. Keith Greenarch: If a website doesn’t get updated it becomes outdated. I’m pleased with the progress. Yesterday we had a great training. Participation is encouraged. We have good time learning as those who attend can testify. Yesterday we worked through resources, one of which is providing information. You will see those on the website under resources. If you think of anything that has not been addressed, please share. Gloria Bellamy: there are 8 scenarios being worked on by SILC resource building teams that will be listed under a topic category in the Resources so consumers can research and gain information. We need your help as this evolves so answers can be found. Will Miller: NCIL (the National Council on Independent Living) Conference is a good conference to attend to learn of the newest developments in Independent Living. If you would like to attend please let the SILC office know. Part B Center Report Rene Cummins, for Helen Pase I am going to tag team with Sandy Ogburn because she is the chair for the committee that monitors, reviews and evaluates what is going on in our Part B Center. Helen was originally scheduled to travel to Denver, CO for ILNET training during this meeting. On Sunday Helen went into the hospital with chest pains. She had a heart catherization. The blockage found was decided was not sever enough to require further procedures. She has been placed in the care of a cardiologist. She is home and doing well. I have given Helen’s report to Sandy Ogburn to read. Sandy Ogburn: DARC (Disability Advocates and Resource Center) continues to serve Pitt, Beaufort and Wilson counties. Our staff has been short two employees because of medical leave, leaving a staff of four to work with consumers and to promote our organization. Our newest staff member is our youth coordinator, who has met a couple of times for events. Several delegates have applied to Youth Leadership Forum. We’ve been very busy doing presentations and manning booths at our different counties such as Kids fest and Pitt county Business Expo, exposing us to over 6,000 people. Some of these attendees have become DARC consumers. Two weeks ago we volunteered at Pitt Co. Special Olympics giving out the award ribbons. We are on target for our goals this year as well as budget. Expenditures of 50% for our 1st 6months put us right where we need to be. We have transitioned one person from a homeless shelter in collaboration with VRIL. The hardship of trying to operate is again present with DVR not reimbursing in a timely manner. The February 14 reimbursement has just been received on April10, only after writing numerous emails to DVR about our financial instability. After using our cash advance of 35K to pay our February and March invoices as well as April expenses, to date, we were overdrawn over 6,000. We cannot operate as we should when have to constantly chase our reimbursement. Respectfully submitted Helen Pase, ED Sierra Royster: What can we do as the SILC to insure or help out the center that is struggling to pay bills? Mark Steele: Good question. I worked hard to get this money flowing. There were a couple of reasons the February payment was delayed. One was absences which a procedure is being worked on for a back up to be put in place. When it went to the controller’s office it was tagged to be put on hold. We haven’t found out yet why that was done. As soon as the VR chief financial officer became aware of this the payment got released. Sandy McMillan: We have been tracking each scenario specifically with the paperwork trying to help the people that are working through these processes above Mark understand the problems we are having. They recognize it’s a problem. We are trying to reach the correct people that are the actual holdup to work around the process. The SILC reimbursements were going through the process as if we were using state funds. We told them that they are receiving the funds from the federal government; we should be put in a special category to be paid quicker. The SILC reimbursements have been on time for a number of months. We have a good tacking record; we are including Part B centers in our conversations with VR. Sierra Royster: When you say you are tracking it I know there was a form that got sent out on all the links that has the centers for their part b contracts. It has when the DSU is paying it but does it have when the centers are submitting for reimbursement? Sandy McMillan: The one for SILC does. I’m sure Helen is doing that but I know it’s much more involved because she has had many situations, bringing out document of her activity, when originally submitted when more inform was requested, when that information was submitted the whole history of these reimbursement requests. This tracking is necessary. Sierra Royster: Can the SILC know this case history? Can we know the whole process; can we see the contacts and follow up? Sandy McMillan: I think we would have to ask Helen if she would be willing to do that. Mark Steele: Gay and I are tracking that procedure. We track when a report is emailed then when the hard copy received, when I sign off on it and send it to fiscal services, when fiscal services approves it and sends it to the controller’s office. Dates and tracking are done. Sandy McMillan: It’s not easy to find the “special” specific person. Mark Steele: While this doesn’t help anyone here get paid, this is a statewide problem. Many vendors are lining up to complain about the controller’s office. Will Miller: We don’t always know when the Part B funds are requested from VR at the SILC office. We didn’t know about the last delay until we were copied on an email from Helen, and then two days later they got their reimbursement. As Sandy mentioned, they are working on systemic issues with VR to work this out. On a monthly basis if the SILC office had more advanced notice of time delays, knowing when a request was sent etc., maybe others involvement could help. If DARC could let us know when reimbursement requests are sent, and then update us along the way, then when there are delays we might be able to do more to help. Also, so that all our members understand, with Part B reimbursement from VR as our DSU, they hold the funds as contract administrator. As we spend money we send reimbursement requests to VR in the form of P&E reports, performance and expenditure reports. We have been told that these reimbursements should be received within 30 days. If it doesn’t come in that time, it is late. This is where problems can arise. Especially for DARC and the SILC office, because we depend almost entirely on Part B funds, when we don’t receive reimbursements in a timely manner we simply run out of cash and have no money to operate. Sandy McMillan: You received a report in the e-blast that shows the total Part B contract. This shows all the money from SILC and Part B Centers totaling $509,000 and where they are year to date. That report has been really helpful. When that is compared back with what is submitted we found dome discrepancies. We are working to resolve these discrepancies as well. Reimbursements sent in different amounts than requested. Jim Whalen: I want to make a suggestion, well two, one general, and one specific to this issue. A little bit ago you were invited to go to NCIL. I would suggest that if you haven’t attended you should. The other suggestion is we spend a lot of time in these meetings talking about what is going on and who inside the loop where it’s not working. Guess what? NC is one of 50 states, when you go to these conferences you can talk to people from other states. Some of them don’t have this problem so I would suggest, find someone from a state that doesn’t have this problem and ask them how they did it. You can take information from other states and bring it here. Instead of worrying about what is broken, find one that is fixed and bring the solution here. Make it your own personal conviction the next time you go outside of NC to find someone who has worked this out and find out how it was done. The more you talk about the problem the more money you waste on it. SPIL Amendment, Rene Cummins, CIL representative In the State Plan, section 3.2 that talks about funding of the network of centers. This is a different funding stream, no longer talking about Part B funds that this council is charged with monitoring, reviewing and evaluating these funds carrying out the state plan. There is a section in there about developing the network of centers that is funded through a different funding stream, which is Part C; the difference is it is direct funding. We pull down our funds from an electronic grant. We don’t run into the same problems that the Part B Center has experienced. In the SPIL because the mission of the SILC is to establish a statewide network of centers, you have to address what your priorities are and how the state will go about using additional funds. The amount of $250,000 is the base level of funding to start a new Part C center. Starting Oct. 1 there will be funds available due to a cost of living adjustment, a total of $26,369 to be distributed in excess of that cost of living adjustment. RSA pointed out that there needed to be an amendment placed to address this excess money are going to be distributed. Amendment: In the event that additional Part c funds become available in excess of the required cost of living increase (COLA) but such funds equal less than 250,000 those funds will be distributed to the existing Part C centers according to the population based formula used to distribute other Part C funds. Action: (Cummins/Watkins) motion amend SPIL Section 3.2, unanimously carried Break: 10:10 – 10:20 SPIL Goal Committees Goal 1, Rene Cummins, co-chair Goal 1 is in a holding pattern because there are no Part B funds to use for this goal’s activities. Goal 2, Sandy McMillan, chair The Goal 2 funded activity is the YLF, Youth Leadership Forum. Sierra will report on where we stand. Please share what the SILC can do to help with YLF, do you want us to show up whatever you need. Sierra Royster: There are 33 states that have a YLF which was started in California in 1992. YLF was basically designed because students in high school with disabilities were not encouraged to go to college or given a path for successfully doing this. The official 1st year was at Pembroke in 2008; we took one year off to do research and picked it back up in 2010. We now hold YLF annually. Through the SPIL there is $20,000 allocated to fund YLF. The YLF is typically held in the state capital at a college campus to encourage that college transition. Most YLFs are targeted for juniors and seniors in high school. We decided in 2010 to include people outside of that time frame who were still working on the college transition expanding it 15 – 28years old. It is open to all NC residents with a disability. The YLF is contracted out and is currently contracted to Alliance of Disability Advocates in Raleigh. We have 20 delegates selected out of 33 applicants. These delegates are from across the state, 7 from Wake county from which we had a large group of applicants and several from Franklin county. Thank for to the VR Counselor’s getting the word out, the majority of calls received were from people who had gotten the information from their VR counselor. The Personnel committee who actually plan this whole event is made up of 5 people with 4 mentors all young people with disabilities. The mentors are delegates selected because of their performance at the last YLF. The committee has selected 3 speakers, Mike Beers out of Montana, who does comedy on the side, is working on scheduling a performance at Charlie Goodnights while in Raleigh, Suki Glick from Atlanta, who will be our facilitator and Stephanie Stanford out of Kansas. We will also have Billy Alton from APRIL via SKYPE. If anyone has Delta sky miles you can donate them on sky wish looking to bring some of our speakers here for free. There are four group leaders, from, Mecklenburg county, Franklin or Granville counties and a county we haven’t reached before from the SC border. The staff training will take place on May 29. We are working on accommodations and interpreters and personal care workers now. YLF will be held July 14 to July 18 at North Hall on NC State University, which will fall the same week of the next SILC meeting. Friday there will be presentations of the delegate’s personal goals and community goals etc. Steve Strom – DD Council – We fund a portion of the speakers cost. Joshua Strasburg from our program management team sits on the committee. There are two universities who have programs that do post secondary programs for students with developmental disabilities, UNC Greensboro and Appalachian, are they involved in YLF? Sierra Royster – We have our resource day but I cannot say that either one of those institutions participate. I do know that some of our past delegates have participated in Beyond Academics. I can be sure that they are invited. Steve Strom – I would suggest that YLF be held on Cullowhee or UNCG at a campus where a program is in place. Sierra Royster – I will take that suggestion back to the committee for 2015. I would like to point out that we do incorporate the CIL’s in the programming. There are three centers currently involved that are CIL peers which make sure we are following consumer control, independent living philosophy those types of things and are also there to mentor people. We have professional peers from two organizations, DD Council and Communication Service for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing out of Greensboro. They help us market and understand processes. Goal 3, Sandy Ogburn, chair We have met one time. We have jobs to complete. The main one is to figure out if there are funds available? Do we need funds to carry out this goal? The main Goal outline, is there web information for the unserved and/or underserved population of NC? Is there a document available on how to start a Center for Independent Living. We need to answer these questions, find out if any of these documents exist and what needs to be done to find funding for this goal if needed. We also need to find out what the CILs are doing to maintain these goals. I need to get together with Rene to discuss these issues. Then Goal 3 committee will meet again. Goal 4, Sierra Royster, chair We have all ready talked about the reimbursements. The Finance Committee will talk about the reallocation of funds. One of the activities is looking at other SPILs and SILCs across the country. It’s been open to anyone to participate those who have shown interest in this is Oshana Watkins, Will Miller and myself. Eleven states have already been contacted, if you think a state does an outstanding job, please let us know. We can start to build partnerships. IL Summit is being planned. Information and ideas are being shared. More information will be shared when details are worked out. We are looking at September. We have one youth applicant to the SILC, there are another who has applied that the Membership Committee will be bringing to the SILC today to vote on. If the Governor appoints these two then there will be four “youth” council members on the SILC. New member orientation was held yesterday for Sandra Hicks. I am glad that she is finally a member after the two year process. Goal 5, Kay Miley, chair We have three centers, disAbility Resource Center in Wilmington, Disability Advocates & Resource Center in Greenville and Alliance of Disability Advocates in Raleigh that have elected to use their Part B funds for transitions. To date they have expended $6,305.94 to support 10 transitions from institutions. That averages out to $630.59 per consumer. The MFP (Money Follows the Person) provides up to $3,000 in support of each transition if they qualify. Keith Greenarch, What is the qualification to be eligible? Kay Miley, Medicaid. Mark Steele, In addition to being Medicaid eligible you have to have been in a skilled nursing facility for three months. In addition to the $3,000, if you need CAP/DA (Community Alternative Program/Disabled Adult) services , whatever county you are in, you are moved to the top of the waiting list. Will Miller, Do we know out of those ten are those completed or in process? Rene Cummins, These are all completed transitions. The money was taken from our Part B operations fund and allocated to transitions. We are also involved with MFP. I thought that all of you on the council would have a good idea to compare and contrast those who can meet the MFP qualifications with actual costs or those who do not want to give up benefits that push them the MFP qualifications. Mark Steele, If you are over the income limit they give you a “spend down” leaving you to survive on $232 a month. It’s a good program but there are many situations that can arise. Rene Cummins, There are many who are excited about the possibility of a transition the final step causes people to say no so they can keep their benefits or income. For those who drop out of the MFP program we try to help with other funds. This is a fine balancing act between IL philosophy and those who do not follow this. Mark Steele, They are not looking at it from an IL philosophy they only come at it from a safety issue. Will Miller, Just wanted to interject because a lot of the words that full-time IL professionals use can make heads spin a little bit. We have some new members, so I just want to make sure everybody understands what we are talking about. These transitions involve people who are in nursing homes or some sort of skilled nursing facility who don’t want to be there. The reason that they are there is that they don’t have the resources to live in the community or they haven’t had the opportunity and need a little help so that they can move out into the community. There are a bunch of different funding sources and agencies that can get involved with helping people to move out, or “transition” out, of a nursing home. A big player in transition services is Centers for Independent Living, who are out there working with these people, patching together resources. VR also works on a lot of transition cases. Some of the Part B dollars that we talk about here at our SILC meetings are part of that patchwork that can help these people move out of these facilities and into the community of their choice. I think that is fantastic, to know that ten lives have been affected in that way, where we have been able to help them to be independent and to move out of these nursing homes. Rene Cummins, I just want to add one thing. On behalf of the transition coordinators, a small group of about five people. They do an extensive risk mitigation plan. They are being over protective in many cases, it’s not like our transition coordinator’s aren’t looking at safety issues but allowing consumers to have dignity and allowing them the risk issue most who would live with the same level of risk. This is includes many young people in their 20’s. We want to find those people who are inappropriately placed and help them get back into the community and get involved. Sierra Royster, How many of the transitions were done with SILC Part B dollars? Mark Steele, All of them. Steve Strom, The DD council is also funding an initiative and working with Disability Rights NC to help people who are interested in getting out of nursing facilities and into community living. If you know of anyone who is a good candidate for these services, please let us know. Sandy McMillan, I want to advocate for young adults who have been raised by their parents and don’t even recognize that they have options. There are a lot of kids trapped home with mom that need to know they can get out. Sierra Royster, Last year there was a delegate who has Cerebral Palsy and uses a wheel chair. The Monday after he left YLF he was put into a nursing home. He was connected with a local CIL, has gotten out, is moving to Charlotte, and is one of the mentors this year for YLF. He is fighting for his rights, has applied to school, has become an advocate, met the right people and is fighting for his rights. Keith Greenarch, I want to commend everyone who works to get folks out of nursing homes. There is nothing better than to see a person be able to make choices and move back into their own place being able to eat what they want to eat, watch what they want to watch and make their own decisions. There is nothing more rewarding. Goal 6, Mark Steele reporting for Kimlyn Lambert, chair We have had two teleconferences, February 7 and April 11. We have three objectives and a lot of activities. Currently these activities are ongoing and in process. Objective 1 is People with disabilities have greater access to transportation. We are looking into getting a centralized list of transportation boards around the state which will help in reporting. I’ve contacted the ADA Coordinator in Winston-Salem. She is helping obtain information for other transportation boards. Objective 2 is people with disabilities have the support necessary to live independently and safely in the community of their choice. I have incorporated a lot of this in my quarterly reports. There has been additional information requested that I have also included which I will share later. Objective 3 involves veterans. The DSU is working more closely with the VA. We are trying to be more proactive. A lot of these activities will be reported annually not quarterly. Executive Committee: Keith Greenarch, chair We have had two committee meetings since last SILC meeting. We voted on allocating the Part C COLA (Cost of Living Allocation) which was $26, 369. We are planning an IL Summit to be held in Sept. in Raleigh. Sierra is the lead and has contacted some venues. October SILC meeting is going to be in Greenville, NC in conjunction with the GREAT Conference put on by NC Assistive Technology. The SILC will have a booth there at the Thursday expo, making a lot of contacts and giving out a lot of information. This will also give the members an opportunity to visit a CIL, Disability Advocates & Resource Center. More information will follow. We are planning an annual review for the Executive Director. Sandy McMillan and I are working on that together. NCIL Conference is in July, we have budget for three attendees. The early bird registration ends next week, see me today if you are interested in going. I do want to mention in July, Will, will be involved in a SILC to SILC mentor training. The mentor coming is Brad Williams from New York. He will spend a day with Will in the office and will attend our board development activity on Thursday. Our elections will be held at the July meeting. We need to be looking at the current slate of officers. Will, will distribute a list of those who are eligible to serve as an officer. Finance Committee, Ping Miller, chair The finance committee had a meeting last week; we are at 43% burning of our financials. We are on target for our VR reimbursement. We will bring two votes to the table today. First I want a 990 form report given by Kathleen Boate, the SILC Bookkeeper. Kathleen Boate, This was my first time working on a 990 return, I had quite a bit of learning curve. I had to feel 100% comfortable before filing so an extension was requested to allow more time. I also had to reflect all the assets were tracked. The assets were tracked on an excel form but not in QuickBooks, so Quickbooks was not matching up with our 990. This is open to public inspection so correctness and 100% confidence in our numbers is a priority. So we arranged for an accountant with non-profit experience to meet with us. We are now putting the assets on the balance sheet to reflect and depreciate them. This allows us to give more information to the public. So the accountant helped us to figure out what needed to be done and the 990 was completed last week to the penny. Ping Miller, the first topic after the 990. The committee has met and looked at the budget. We have the projected budget for this year displayed on the screen. The amount is $192,850. After reviewing each of the buckets of funds we found that $13,500 could be reallocated back to the Centers for Independent Living to help fund SPIL Goal activities. This would bring the SILC office budget down to $179,350. This was obtained by looking over areas where we were not using all the allocated funds. I move that we vote to amend the SILC budget, to approve a reduction in the SILC budget to $179,350 and allow a reallocation to the CILS of $13,500. Will Miller, I want to clarify that this is just for the fiscal year. We are being very conscious at the SILC office because our funds are Part B funds that could also go to consumer services, so we are trying to find savings where ever we can. This year, at the middle of the year, we are forecasting this amount, but depending on the year and what is going on we may have more or less expenses or savings. Action: (Miller/Bellamy) unanimous approval Ping, the second topic references the reallocation of funds to the CILS. Sandy McMillan, $8,358 is the amount of Part B funds each center received this year. Since the Shabazz center will be unable to contract for the money this year due to the problems they have, we would like to be sure the funds can be utilized by consumers. I move that this additional amount be reallocated to the other seven centers. Mark Steele, this money was discovered months ago. We came up with a formula to track the money and found this amount not being used. It has to go through the SILC in order to be reallocated. Sierra Royster, you said that this money will go to the centers and for consumers. Will this fund specific SPIL goals? Sandy McMillan, once the vote has been taken we will go to the sizing we have of dollars to SPIL goals and will get input from Rene as the Center representative. We will then discuss as a SILC to determine where the money will be allocated. The Centers probably won’t see these dollars until June or July because of the contract changes. This is to be sure that these dollars are used for consumers and not leave any on the table. Mark Steele, once you guys determine how you want the money to be spent it creates an amendment process to the contracts. This takes three months on a good quarter. So the sooner you guys decide how you want the money to be spent the better. An updated budget and scope of work is needed to process. Action: (McMillan/Ogburn) unanimous vote approved the motion Sandy McMillan: In reviewing the budgets we found that two Part B Centers actuals, the Wilmington and Greenville CIL both are missing $1,000. Mark Steele, the money was held out to go towards the Network of CILs. Sandy McMillan: Since the Network is not up and running we need to get that $1,000 each back into their contracts. Do we need to vote to amend contracts but since it’s all lumped together, vote so it’s all covered? Motion: We add back to the Greenville and Wilmington CIL contracts, $1,000 each that had previously been held out from their current contracts. Action: (McMillan/Kaufman) unanimous vote approved the motion Sandy McMillan: All should have received the paperwork being discussed and shown on the screen. I wanted to review the SPIL activities and the cost involved. I met with Rene and assigned a dollar amount to each activity. These were reviewed with the dollar amount associated with each activity. We want to decide how we will take the $21,858 that we just now freed up to now fund some of these activities which could be shown in the contract amendments for each Center. We have money to work with. Each activity and year of SPIL and frequency was considered and is shown on the screen. We as a committee can decide how to fund these activities, and what that means for the Centers from a dollars perspective. So when we got the dollar figure I talked to Rene and asked her to speak to the other Center Directors. Rene has talked to them and is representing them here today, and she will tell us what they would like to do with the $21,858. Rene Cummins, The Center Directors had a meeting last week and I have spoken with the directors that weren’t present. This is a unanimous report from all the Center Directors. In light of the process we went through last year where we had contracts that were amended by this same process we are doing here today, we had contracts that started on August 15 and ended September 1. This means there is a very small window to move those funds out. We want to be sure to utilize the funds because we know there is a need. These funds would move into the existing contracts for seven of the Centers. There are three options in the State Plan for the money being moved out that could be reallocated to other goals. We have three prioritized as follows. 1. The top priority we voted on was to allocate the funds to Goal 3 providing direct services under general operations. We would divide the funds and allocate them to the seven existing CIL contracts, because you have to move them into existing contracts, and it has to come under the goals. We know that, no matter when these funds show up, we could turn it around and use the money to provide our core services. This will allow us to use the money no matter what. We could very easily generate a scope of work based on what we are doing and using the money to fund those four core services. We feel like that is our first priority because we know we could use the funds this way no matter when they show up. 2. The second priority would be under Goal 1 activity 2, network building, but again we have the reservation that when the funds show up we would have to scramble to make plans for them, not allowing the full use. 3. The third priority is Goal 5 under transitions, three centers are currently involved in transition services but again you never know what we would have in place ready to go, and we might not have sufficient time to expend these moneys. Our top priority is to put it under Sandy Ogburn’s Goal 3, under general operations, and we would be able to turn it around and report back to Mark on our direct core services that we are currently doing with general operations money. Sandy McMillan, What I am hearing is that your first priority would be to put it into general operation funds. Rene Cummins, Yes. Sandy McMillan, But then we wouldn’t have specific goals funded. Is that correct? Other than Goal 3.1.1, “At a minimum, the current level of funding for CILs is maintained, and funding increases are the optimum outcome.” Rene Cummins, Yes, the one that is in our current contracts where we have Part B funds supporting general operations. What that really turns around into is a report back to Mark on provision of our core services our direct services of advocacy, independent living skills, information and referral, ad peer mentoring and support. That’s what we do with these general operations funds. We turn that around into direct services under our core services. Our concern from the Centers, and this was unanimous among all the Center Directors, is that we do not want to see funds turned back to the federal level as has happened in the past because this is reflecting on the state of North Carolina as if we do not need these Part B funds. We know that because this budget that we are looking at right now is in its second year, we have twenty-four months for all of our budgets, but unfortunately we don’t see them until they are already in their second year. So these funds will only be available until September 30th, and the Center Directors concern is that, even though Mark is working on streamlining that process and not taking that amount of time, we have to go by the precedent, and last year funds were identified in January, and they were reallocated and made available, for my Center it was August 15 and for Julia Sain’s Center it was September 1. That’s how the funds were reallocated last year, and they were reallocated into transitions, and we were the two Centers who were doing transitions under Money Follows the Person. This year, we would like to see the $21,858 put into the existing contracts for the other seven Centers. To Aaron’s credit, Aaron identified this problem last June and knew that, because of an IRS error, his Center was not able to sign one of the certifications to enter into a contract. So that’s why his funds are being reallocated. He knew that for the first year of the state plan, that this was going to be necessary, but we are just now reallocating these funds, and it’s April. So our concern is that the turnaround time on this, it needs to go into an activity where we know for sure there will be no problem moving these funds out. Therefore that was the thinking from the Center Directors on prioritizing. We would like to see the goals under the state plan, especially my goal, Goal 1, be able to be funded, but frankly with this length of time that we have left, we are in the seventh month now, and we don’t know when this money is going to actually appear in those contracts and be available. The thinking from the Center Director’s is let’s make sure that this gets reallocated in such a way that it also gets expended by September 30 so that’s the reason for our priority. That’s not what we would like to see happen, but we’re looking at the facts of the case and what is probably most advisable for this short span of time. Sandy McMillan, OK. Mark, I’ve got to tell you, this is not the way I wanted these dollars to go. I was hoping that we could use them to fund activity 1, activity 2, and this kind of stuff. I’m trying to think, is there a certain cutoff point, if we get them to the Centers by x date, could we then allocate them to the goals rather than just putting them into general operating funds? Could we get to some sort of brokered agreement. This is the kind of conversation that we as a SILC need to be having. This is the meat of what we are doing, so please don’t let me stand here and talk all by myself. Rene Cummins, This was very much a part of our discussion, and given more time, we would really rather utilize these funds in a different way. Like I said, we would love to have some funds for network building because that’s why goal 1 and the activities under objective 2 went into the state plan. But knowing that the reality is that these funds may not show up until the last month, hopefully that won’t happen again but that’s the precedent. That’s what happened last year. Those funds were identified in January. We are identifying a similar situation at the end of April, so the Center Directors are looking at this in terms of to be on the safe side and for the benefit of the SILC, and for you not having Part B funds turned back again as happened last year, that we would really rather do something different, but we’re going to forego that knowing that the best bet to make sure that whenever these funds show up they can be turned around into direct services and nbe expended, and we will not have a problem because all seven of us, when they show up we will at least have that month. We do have general operations expenses each and every month so we can turn them around into direct services. It’s not what we would like to see happen but we’re looking at the reality of the situation and foregoing what we would love to see happen, and hopefully will happen next year. But for this year, in order to not have any funds turned back, that this $21,858 can go into those existing contracts and be moved out even if it shows up September 1. We know that that is a sure thing, so I guess we’re just not willing to gamble on North Carolina turning back any more Part B funds. Will Miller, If the funds do go back into general operating budgets, will the SILC hear about how those funds are used for consumers? Rene Cummins, Absolutely. That’s what we report on to Mark each and every month that we turn in a P&E report. Now in my budget, as you heard from Kay Miley’s report, I have moved $6,000 into the line item supporting transitions that fall out of Money Follows the Person, so what I’m reporting for general operations is just that small amount of money remaining beyond that. But the other contracts that the other Centers that are getting this $8,358 I think is what the figure is, are going into general operations and they are reporting that to Mark. I think, for future reference, I’m going to talk to the Center Directors about getting this information to Sandy Ogburn because these Part B moneys come under Sandy’s committee, and her committee should be reporting that back. Sandy and I touched base on that, and I’m going to see that all of the P&E information that goes to Mark, also goes to Sandy so that by the time she comes to the next SILC meeting, she will be able to report what kind of services have been provided based on those general operation funds since the last SILC meeting. That should have been happening anyway, but this is a work in progress, so we are slowly getting all the pieces in place on this giant jigsaw puzzle. Yes, that’s information for the Part B dollars that should be coming back to the SILC. The feeling among the Centers was, this is not the best case scenario of what we would like to see happen, but in the interest of your Part B dollars not being turned back to the federal level, we all felt like maybe this is the safest, most secure thing to recommend. That’s why it’s our first priority. Sandy Ogburn, I’m a little confused. Just clarify for me, if the funds go into general funding, does that not mean that it can be allocated to goal1 or goal 2 or whatever it is you guys want to prioritize it for once we have the money? Rene Cummins, That’s an excellent question Sandy. We are operating under contracts right now, and those are the contracts Mark talks about. Mark gave us the option of what line items we wanted to put into our budget, and that’s why I elected to put in a line item for transitions. So we can only put this funding into the line items that are in our already-existing contracts. Every one of the Centers across all of our contracts all have in our budget a line item for general operations. In the Rehabilitation Act, in Section 713 when it talks about what are the appropriate uses of these Part B funds, there are seven things listed there, and one of them is to support your network of Centers for general operations. But general operations means that we turn that around into providing our four core services, because we know that every one of the Centers is doing those four core services. So we all have that line item. If we don’t have a line item in our already-existing contract, then we are not going to be able to amend our contract, amend our budget, and put that money in our budget. So we have to work within these small parameters. There has to be already-existing contracts, and whatever line items are in those contracts. Mark could speak to that more, but I have a line item for transitions, and then I have a line item for general operations, but across all the contracts, everyone has a line item for general operations. So that would be the most expedient, quickest and easiest way to split this. It’s going to divide out by seven, so whatever $21,858 is divided by seven. We felt like if we get that money by September 1, we all feel confident we can move it out because we all have general operations expenses each and every month, and then we would turn that around into reporting on four core services that we provided in exchange for those general operations funds. Because that’s how our contracts are written and we have to operate within those guidelines of what we have in our contracts. Sandy McMillan, Am I hearing then that we could not add goal-level information to the contracts because it doesn’t already exist in there? Mark Steele, I’m not sure. Like Rene said, since we have existing contracts, if you are moving money around within the contract without adding or taking away, that doesn’t require an amendment. When you start adding money to the contract or taking it away, that does take an amendment. Then adding another goal to the contract gets complicated. Jim Whalen, You have to get your scope of work approved then, because you are changing your scope of work, right? Mark Steele, Even adding money to the line item is going to change your scope of work, so you have to do an updated scope of work anyway. So I would have to go to my contract manager over me. I’ve been through this one time and, going back to last year’s, there was money available in January to do amendments. Well I came on board in February, and then it took me awhile to get up and running. That contributed to the delay in having the money available last year. Hopefully this year, since I’ve been through it one time, hopefully I can get these through much quicker this time around. But to answer your question, I need to go back to someone over me to find that out for sure. Rene Cummins, Mark, you may not have the answer to this question, but the Center Directors have this question. We are trying to avoid this having to go all the way back to the beginning through the process of once a month, when the Center for Excellence meets, because we know in the beginning, they have to look over these contracts. Mark Steele, They still will have to. Any amendment has to. Rene Cummins, OK. So if we make this as uncomplicated as possible, then that might expedite the process. I don’t know for sure because the process on your end better, but that was our concern, that if we make a whole lot of changes, then that may be something that’s going to slow up the process. We were trying to figure out a way to expedite that as much as possible. Mark Steele, In my understanding about the process, though, any amendment, no matter how complicated or simple, still has to go through the same process, and that involves the Center of Excellence. Rene Cummins, So that is a concern, because I know that they only meet once a month. So we have to get in front of them with any of these changes, and it may not happen immediately. So that’s part of our concern, that we’re wanting to make sure that these Part B funds for this year, I mean, that’s why you’re going through all the trouble of reallocating them, because like Ping said, here are some funds that it looks like, under the present contracting system that we have that are not going to be expended, so if we move them we want to make sure that they get moved out by September 30th. So that’s the concern on behalf of the Centers that we don’t want to see these Part B dollars turned back again. Sierra Royster, Can I just say something? I’m looking at the SPIL, and I was here yesterday for Julia’s presentation on 704 reports, and I understand that I work with a Center, and those of you who don’t work for a Center don’t understand the ins and outs of a lot of that, just like if you didn’t work somewhere else, you wouldn’t understand everything that was going on there. What we put in our SPIL is what Centers do. That’s what we do. We’re doing it every day. Julia talked about it in our 704 report, have so much stuff that we have to report on that doesn’t even make sense, but we do it because we’re told to do it, and not only are we told to do it, we do it because it’s important. Transitions, goal 5. We’re doing that. We’re doing that when Money Follows the Person says you don’t need it. We’re going no, that’s not going to happen, we’re not going to turn our back on somebody, we’re going to make it happen. Whether it’s out of unrestricted funds, which you guys don’t have any say over, it happens. I’m looking at goal 3, objective 3.1, service areas do not become unserved or underserved to a greater degree, and previously unserved consumers in North Carolina are served. That goal is to find people who don’t have services. We talked about Money Follows the Person and making every single person. Sandy talked about those twenty-one year olds who don’t know that they have options. That’s what are Centers are doing and that’s hopefully why we are sitting around this table. We’re sitting here because that’s what we do. I understand that I don’t do the same youth program that Jim does. I don’t do the same youth program that Gloria does. But we have to report on it, it comes on our P&E, it comes on our 704, and you can access all of those things. I would encourage us not to send money back when we’re sitting here around the table in every other conversation going “how can we reach more people?” And we’re sitting here going, “well, I want to make sure it falls under this line item, or we want to make sure it hits here. Maybe we need to talk about how can we make sure that’s happening, but make sure that the money still happens. So is it coming back to the SILC meeting going, “Sandy, on Goal 3, can you report how moneys have done this.” And maybe we ask those questions, but I hope that VR gets the process going. I don’t want to put money, $21,000, and hope. Really hope. When it gets to September, that’s a scramble because then all those people who were told that “you can transition, but we don’t have funds to pay for that right now. Oh wait, we have thirty days to do it,” then are we serving our people? Are we serving our people? The people who get the money and make sure that happens, they’re not at this table. So we’re now making decisions about people who don’t even know we’re having a conversation, and honestly, a lot of those people, I wonder if they even know that we exist, as Centers and as a SILC. So I just encourage you, the Center Directors have a lot to report on. Julia, I didn’t even understand all of it until I heard yesterday that report on the 704. So I just encourage us to think about the bigger picture. If we get lost in what line item, what goal, what activity? How about we look at “we have money, and that’s a good thing. That’s a really good thing” And how about we figure out how to ask them to report on that. Mark Steele, Like I said, however you guys choose to spend the money, it’s going to require an amendment, and that process is going to be the same for any amendment that I have to do. So you guys tell me how you want the money to be spent and give me your scope of work, and I’ll push it through as quick as I can. Sandy McMillan, I get you. I understand all that. The thing is, is that you have to look at it from, this SILC is a government-appointed council, and we gotta make ourselves look good to. I mean, we have to have results for what they’re investing in us. Sierra Royster, That’s what we need to ask for then. Sandy McMillan, So we all need to work together as to how we make our reports that Will actually has to complete at the SILC office, what’s in the SPIL, to make sure that we are taking full credit for how we are spending the Part B moneys. Also we have to keep in mind, we can’t ask the Centers to tag their outcomes to things that are accomplished with funds that are other funds. In other words, there’s kind of a correlation, or you have to marry together what’s in the P&E and what are the results. They have to match. You can’t take what you do with other funds and count them for this bucket, and also that bucket. So although you hate to get caught up in what line item it’s in, it is important and you can’t ignore it. Reporting is our outside vehicle to what the SILC does, and we just gotta make sure we are strong. Will Miller, The SILC office and the DSU also have a 704 report that we complete, and I don’t want to get sidetracked by that because, to what Sierra said, what should drive decisions about these funds is how can they best benefit consumers. How can we make these dollars benefit the most for consumers? That should drive our decision making. But that being said, we do have a 704 we have to complete, and, you know, a SILC duty is to create a state plan that develops goals for these funds, and the SILC has to report on how we’re doing that, how we’re being good stewards of these funds. One part of that report is how these goals in our SPIL are being funded and carried out, so the council does have an obligation to know where those funds are going to when we’re talking about Part B funds. The purpose behind that report is that we want to justify to our funders that we’re using these funds responsibly, that the SILC processes are being carried out, that the activities that we identified as important for the people in the state are being funded. So we do have to be able to document that process in our report. You know, in the Part I 704 report. But again, what should drive this is what is going to be the most beneficial for consumers. Gloria Garton: I have a question. I know how complicated this is, and I can still relate to what Sierra just said. The report that Julia gave yesterday I think really needs to become essential and a starting point for anyone who is new to a CIL, that works for one, I think it needs to be done at the SILC, and you know what? I don’t think it would hurt for it to be done every year. Because this is so complicated, and you can forget essential parts. Having said that, in an effort to be more collaborative, is what kind of ideas do you Because when I think about the reports that I send to Mark each month, yes there’s a performance piece of it, and then there’s a piece that tells you where each dollar goes. So in order for me to show how we’re doing our activities, I have to assign it to travel when Stevie goes out to a county that’s fifty miles away from Wilmington to deliver a self-advocacy class at a high school in Columbus County. That gets assigned to her personal work time, and to travel, and mileage, and any printing we’ve done. So under general operations where you have all these things listed, that goal is being supported by funds from those three areas. So I don’t know if that helps or if that makes it more complicated, but it does show that those funds that you put in there for the activities in the SPIL, are going to many different cost items within our budget to support those activities. It’s not just one line item or category of cost items, it’s numerous ones. Does that make sense? Sandy McMillan, I think what I’m hearing is that, even though it’s in a general operating expense, it is supporting the goals that are in our SPIL. The question is how can we capture that activity against our goals so that we look like we’re actually performing and doing what we were chartered to do? Without hurting the integrity of your different funding sources and recognizing that as well. Rene Cummins, I think there’s no question about the integrity of recommending that these funds be utilized this way, since in the law itself in Section 713 it enumerates what you can do with these Part B funds. It says right there, “Support your network of Centers for general operations.” The reason it says that is because they know that that support of general operations turns around into what Gloria just said, and supports all of the direct services that we do. Sierra identified in the plan where this would be reported. Now, having said that, we would love to see, myself more that anybody, I have goal 1 and I have no funds. This is not the time, though, to try to address that. I would love to see that addressed in doing a state plan amendment for years two and three, where there is funding in all of those activities. Believe me, it’s not fun for me to have a goal that that lists activities, and we have no funds to carry out those activities. I would love to put this money, like I said, under objective 2, so that the network could do network building because that’s what we really want to do, and there’s nothing more appropriate in the law then helping, because you’re here to establish a statewide network of Centers for Independent Living. When Julia talked about all the changes that happened in 1992, and I know everybody wasn’t here yesterday but I agree with Gloria. I think sending out that powerpoint to show this is the hallmark and this is what changed in 1992, and why. That’s what Julia was addressing yesterday in some of the history and background, and that’s when SILCs began. That’s when they were charged with the responsibility of helping each of your states to establish your statewide network of Centers. So it’s no happenstance that that is enumerated in the law. It’s appropriate. Now I guess the hangup might be that you think that supporting your network of CILs for general operations in some way doesn’t result in serving consumers, but that’s entirely wrong because that’s exactly what Sierra read there. We turn that around and turn that into the direct services and all of that does get reported back to Mark. I think that’s what we were saying before, “boy we better make sure reporting that to Sandy. Sandy Ogburn is the chair of that committee, and all of this Part B funding and reports. When we send it to Mark, I’m going to suggest that we also send it to Sandy so that she can compile her report and come back and say “this amount of money was expended, because like Sierra pointed out before, if you look on the website, that’s just what invoices have been paid, and that’s really not up to the minute up-to-date. What I gave Kay was up to date on what we’ve done with Part B funds, and our transitions. We would be able to give to Sandy, up to that last month that ended before your SILC meeting, where we are with moving Part B funds out and what we have turned those into. So there shouldn’t be any problem with that, but believe me, I would love to see he SILC tackle the fact that, we have an approved state plan, but it has two-and-a-half goals out of five that have no funding, and maybe that is something to be addressed when we’re not facing a clock that’s running down. I would like to see it go into one of those unfunded goals, but frankly, we know that if we do that that we might not be able to turn the funds around and make use of them. That may happen, but hopefully it won’t. Like Mark said, he’s on top of this process this year, but there’s so much of this, it’s not Mark, it’s beyond Mark, it’s above and beyond when we send stuff to him. When we send Mark our invoices, I don’t blame him for what happens. Mark emails me right away. It’s what happens beyond that. That’s what you heard in Helen’s report. I can guarantee you, Helen got that report to Mark, and it was not having a February and March invoice unpaid when she was trying to pay her April expenses, it’s somewhere up there in the system. The same thing had happened with this amendment, so knowing that, the Center Directors said that we would forego what we would really like to see happen, in light of reality, and say this is the safest most expedient thing to do is to put this into general operations because we know we can turn it around, provide direct services, and no Part B funds should be turned back this year. So that’s our consideration. That’s not what I would like to see happen in an ideal world, but I think we have to tackle this two-and-a-half goals in our state plan with no funding, and we have to tackle that for years two and three, but not necessarily when the clock’s running out, because these funds are already aging out. They’re only here until September 30 and then they’re gone. Aaron Shabazz, You wanted the recommendation of the CIL Directors, and I think, Rene, you have done a good job of outlining what that recommendation is. It is a good recommendation, and we all agree on that. When you put money towards the general operations, that translates into helping consumers. It’s all about the consumers. Everything that a Center does is about how we can help consumers to get to their goals and objectives. And the best way for you to help them to get to those goals and objectives is to help us do our job. The way that we can best do our job is to put this money towards general operations. It does translate into helping consumers, no doubt about that. And as Rene said we want to make sure these funds are used and not given back to to the feds. The best thing that we can do, or that you can do, is to follow that recommendation. It’s a good recommendation. There is no need to continue rehashing the same point over and over and over again. It is a good recommendation. I hope that you will follow it. Joshua Kaufman, The first part of what I was going to do, Aaron just did most of, which is to recap briefly. The second part is to help allay some of the concerns about putting the money into general funds. It helped for me, not being one of the people who works for one of the CILs, to hear of an example of some of the things that could be done with money after it is put into general funds. The example of somebody going to a county fifty miles away to do a presentation at a high school helped me get a better understanding of the specifics of how that money is used to benefit consumers. Can we hear just two or three other examples real quick? I don’t want to belabor this because I think we’ve already talked about some of this, but can we have a few more concrete examples from some of the CIL Directors? Rene Cummins, I make a suggestion, and this actually should have happened earlier, and I think it would have been helpful. Gloria is waiting to do the Center Directors report and I think if we move her into doing that Center Directors report, because her report is a small amalgamation of things we’ve done from all of our Centers because we didn’t want to have you here all day, but the report is things we have all been working on in all of the eight Centers. Because all of the eight Centers and seven Center Directors, because Barbara Davis is actually the Director for both the Disability Partners Asheville and Disability Partners Sylva. Gloria, I’ll leave that up to you because I know you’re waiting to do a report. Center Director’s Report, Gloria Garton I could take up a whole day reporting all the activities that the Centers are a part of. I am hoping the report on the activities will answer questions raised. I will give highlights of activities since January of this year. Youth Empowerment and Leadership, is a goal that each center works on. Since January we have done self-advocacy classes in twelve high schools over a five county area. In the Wilmington Center the transition coordinator is paid through Part B dollars. When she goes off to do a class not only is her time her travel is also paid by part b$$. YLF is pad out of part b and Jim is doing stuff out of pt b. Jim is doing a disability sensitivity training with 2nd graders in WS area. He’s not only brought it out of the classroom the students can send questions to Uncle Jim. What a wonderful interactive way building peers. Part b and c both help to pay for this activity. YLF is paid for by pt b $$ that Alliance and 2 other centers are working on. During the wk of the YLF the centers extra funding needed to send staff other resources are not available. Healthy education advocacy and relationship training that was held weekly during Feb for young adults with dis. System wide advocacy provide to different businesses, ex. Julia give education to 2 lawyers regarding providing effective communication causing a policy change to provide ASL interpreters. Wilmington center is sitting on the New Hanover Co. comprehensive plan to provide input to insure fairness and equity for people with disabilities. In Charlotte area during recent snow storm made the public aware that improper snow removal was impeding and creating barriers for people with disabilities. On an individual level, again these are only highlights. Three IEP issues were resolved. One individual was represented in an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission hearing, for a company violating ADA Title 1 rights winning the case. Two individuals were represented by CILs, Charlotte and Wilmington, in appeals for food stamps, both cases were won. In Charlotte an individual was represented and won in reconsideration for housing accommodations. An individual who was denied many times for Social Security disability benefits was represented by Disability Resource Center and were able to get his case appealed and won. Another case was a child and parent being represented in an appeal with a school for refusing a service animal’s presence with the case being won. There are many things we do that don’t fit under the four core services but benefit people with disabilities. Asheville, Sylva and Raleigh CILs are participating in Community Health and Inclusion Index Project which will result in more individuals with disabilities being included in the health system. Shabazz center recently participated in a one year research study to disclose housing discrimination against people with disabilities in the rental market. I can’t wait to see this report, surveying 50 rental sites. It will be published next year. Wilmington CIL was just awarded funding to work to protect the hidden homeless, people with disabilities who are not in shelters but couch surfing with friends or family, not having a place to call home. We have partnered with our local Ten Year Plan to End Homelessness to create medical respite housing for people who are homeless with disabilities who cannot stay in shelters. Providing wrap around services coordinated by CIL, in all the things that we do. What really sold our funding source is that when these individuals leave, the CIL services will continue, they are free, not on a case management system creating limits with dollars or time. We can work with the person until they meet every single goal. Independence is achieved because we can partner with many different agencies such as SOAR who can help individuals receive funds quickly. CILS are most known for our advocacy, this report shows this. I would like to end this report by reading a paragraph from the report of the Adaptables, written by Jim Whalen. “To all of you partners in the disability world regardless of who does or doesn’t sign your check the adaptable would like to state for the record that every time we take part in the life of someone who decides to make the choice to be more independent or to promote the independence of others, it’s a highlight for us. It’s an accomplishment, that’s IL baby.” I sent my written report last night and sent it to the SILC office; please feel free to share with the entire SILC. Jim Whalen, This is a hard time but I am leaving North Carolina. I’ve seen this SILC grow, seen it move sometimes forward, sideways sometimes directions unknown. I’m going to Michigan in two weeks. They do things differently there, some of the same battles and headaches but if they are good ideas I’ll send them back. Keep struggling it’s worth it. Thank you Lunch: 12:33 – 1:45 The meeting was reconvened by Keith Greenarch at 1:45pm. There is a motion to take the $21,858 and split it seven ways to all centers excluding the Shabazz Center, $3,122 per center to be placed in General Operating Expense. Action: (McMillan/Bellamy) motion carried unanimously Policy and Long Term Planning, Joshua Kaufman, chair We are following up to the Thursday training regarding the 704 reports to do training that includes training regarding Needs Assessment. I would like to encourage all to attend the Thursday session in July. The October Thursday training will not be a formal training we are hoping to have a Center visit in Greenville instead. We continued the Resource projects that Gloria Bellamy was so nice to put together for us. I appreciate the facilitation yesterday and during the past year. If you were not here please touch base with the coordinator of your particular scenario. These projects are due to Debbie at the SILC office by May 15, packaged nicely with a little bow on them not needing any formatting changes or proofing ready to appear on the website. Membership, Sierra Royster, chair The committee has been meeting. I would like to read the Technical Assistance Circular that was recently received from RSA particularly pertaining to membership. This is from section 3: What are the composition and membership requirements of the SILC? Section 705(b)(2) of the Rehabilitation Act and federal regulations at 34 CFR 364.21(b)(2) outline how the SILC is to be composed. Federal statute and regulations do not quantify or cap the size of the SILC unlike the State Rehabilitation Council (SRC), which must be composed of at least 15 members. The SILC must include at least one director of a center for independent living (CIL) chosen by the directors of the CILs in the state. The SILC must also include, as ex-officio, non-voting members: a DSU representative and representatives from other state agencies that provide services to individuals with disabilities. Unlike the SRC, where the DSU representative must be the DSU director, the DSU representative on the SILC does not have to be the DSU director. The SILC may include: other representatives from CILs; parents and legal guardians of individuals with disabilities; advocates of and for individuals with disabilities; private business representatives; representatives from organizations that provide services to individuals with disabilities; and other appropriate individuals. This next part is very important! A majority of all SILC members--voting and ex-officio members combined--must be individuals with disabilities and not employed by any state agency or CIL In addition, a majority of the voting members of the SILC must be individuals with disabilities not employed by any state agency or CIL. We have to look outside of state agencies because all of our Ex officio’s are from state agencies. We are not in compliance according to this circular. We need to look for other non-profits that work with people with disabilities. Sandy McMillan: Can people be reclassified if they are already members, such as me as I’m affiliated with many other nonprofits, I am a parent. Sierra Royster: The parent is a “May” not a “shall”. Will Miller: It’s not that we have to have a certain number of private nonprofits but that we have to have a certain number of our full membership including Ex Officios who are people with disabilities who are neither employed by centers for independent living or state agencies. Right now we have five out of six of our Ex Officios that are state agencies. Even if they had a representative who was a people with disabilities they wouldn’t count towards that quota of majority of members with a disability who do not work for a center for independent living or a state agency. Right now we have 17 voting members, 10 of those members are people with disabilities. When you add the Ex Officios we have we have 11 out of 23 so we don’t have the majority of the full membership. Those five out of Ex. Officio seats will always go automatically to people who cannot help us meet this requirement. We want to be sure that new members will be people with disabilities. The Governor is the one that ultimately makes these appointments. This is a recent interpretation from RSA and according to this we are not in compliance. Mark Steele: Is that TAC on the website? Is it available? Sierra Royster: It was emailed out but not ten days prior, that is why I am reading it. Will Miller: We will add this document to the Membership Committee page on the website. Sierra Royster: There are a couple other things I want to bring to your attention. One is that we cannot use Federal dollars to fund someone with an expired term. We have had a member who is not here today because she is past her term. Even though the state said for her to continue to serve the federal statutes does not allow this. Keith Greenarch: Since her term expired and she has been making committee decisions and votes I don’t see that she can continue because of expired term. Any vote taken under these circumstances would be nullified. Sierra Royster: There have only been two votes. One was voting to recommend to the full council a prospective new member, removing her vote would create a tie in a vote to recommend this applicant. The second vote was a unanimous vote so even removing Dorothy’s vote it would’ve carried. How do we want to handle the tied vote? We were going to bring two applicants to the full council requesting endorsement. I will bring Ricky Alewine who was voted by the membership committee unanimously to the council now. Teresa Staley: Rickey Alewine is a young man who is from Onslow County, living in Jacksonville. He is an individual who is deaf. He is a graduate student at UNC Wilmington getting his masters in Conflict Management and Resolution. He has done a lot of advocacy work going to mayor’s committee meetings in both New Hanover and Onslow Counties. Ricky is a member of National Association of Deaf and the North Carolina Association of Deaf. He is a member of He is familiar with VR more so than CILs. The membership committee would like to recommend to the Council Ricky Alewine for endorsement to be sent to the Governor’s office. Action: (Royster/McMillan) motion carried unanimously Barry Washington was going to be brought to the council, but by excluding Dorothy’s vote, there was not a quorum. This will need to be taken back to membership for another vote. Sierra Royster: The other item that is being brought to the full council is Zach Commander. According to our by-laws, if you miss two meetings for unexcused absences it is to be voted to release them as a member. Since Zach has not attended since January of 2013, only one was excused. Keith Greenarch: Debbie, were you able to speak to him? Debbie Hippler: No Sierra Royster: Every time I have spoken to him he has expressed interest in participating. Keith Greenarch: He did reapply. Sierra Royster: Yes, he did and was reappointed, however has not participated in any council meeting or committee meeting. I recommend on behalf of the Membership committee that Zach Commander be voted off the council. Keith Greenarch: What will happen is that the membership has made a recommendation, the council will vote on it. The name will be sent to the Governor’s office that he was not in compliance to our by-laws. Action: (Royster/ Kaufman) motion carried unanimously Sierra Royster: On a higher note, we have had one person make it through the entire process whose application was sent to the Governor’s office. She is a person who has a disability from Wake County, this will help our numbers. We have a number of vacancies and now with the vote concerning Zach this will create another vacancy. We need to work to fill these spots. Keith Greenarch: In regards to Zach Commander, a letter needs to be drafted mentioning today’s vote. This will be sent to Zach informing him of the action. The SILC office will take care of this. Board Representative Reports Rehab Council for the Blind – Will Miller for Dorothy Frye Dorothy Frye was unable to join us, no report will be given. Will Miller shared about the upcoming forums they will hold. North Carolina Rehabilitation Council – Will Miller I attended the SRC meeting on March 17 and 18 in Rocky Mount. A big part of the meeting was the public forum as part of their needs assessment. The NCRC is another council required under rehab act they help to develop a state plan that addresses VR services in NC. We approve our SPIL last year, they have to have theirs submitted by the end of June or July this year. This experience was real helpful to me because it’s something we will need to do for our next SPIL process. Between now and the due date for our next SPIL, the SILC needs to identify the needs for IL services in the state. This will help us draft our SPIL goals so it will capture what our centers are doing, which will help our Centers, Council and most importantly our consumers. There were staff and consumers at this public forum sharing ideas and experiences as well as feedback on how rehabilitation services could be improved in the state. Many of the people who show up for these forums are people who feel that they have fallen through the cracks. There were probably six or 7 people who spoke. The Rehab council pointed out that there had been hiring freezes in a lot of areas that have affected services. In some areas, because of hiring freezes, there are fewer counselors, and the counsellors they have feel like they have super human caseloads that they are having trouble keeping up with. The next day at the Friday meeting there was discussion about reflecting that feedback from consumers and staff in the state plan. There was a long report about the needs assessment process by Jeff Stevens, who is the expert on needs assessment at DHHS. Jeff will be presenting on the needs assessment process at our next Thursday Member enrichment training in July. I’m still waiting to hear from any council member who would serve as our representative to the State Rehabilitation Council. Anyone who is interested please contact the SILC office. The SILC is required by law to have a member on the SRC. Serving on the SRC is a great opportunity to learn more about rehabilitation services and other disability-related services that are going on in the state. In the meantime I will continue to serve as the SILC representative. Medicaid – Long Term Services – Teresa Staley – I don’t feel like I have been the best representative because I’ve not been able to attend all the meetings with weather being an issue. I have a summary of the different items on their website. The Medicaid long term services and support stakeholder engagement group is funded by NC DD Council. The facilitators for the meetings were from the National Association of State Directors of Developmental Disabilities Services. The first meeting in Oct. was about learning of legislative changes in order to make informed decisions, to carry information back to the community to inform others, to have a better way to handle Medicaid money. The Developmental Disabilities Council wants a group of stakeholders educated and able to advocate for what they believe in, with the idea being cross disability representation from across the state. I was able to attend the November 8th meeting. It continued the process that was started at the first meeting. A presentation of the history of Medicaid was made in the morning, with the rest of the day focusing on waivers and managed care money. Moving towards what an ideal system would look like using managed care. In December there was a webinar that focused on what is important in managed care in NC. January meeting was about five desired outcomes for North Carolina managed care and discussion of two complications, National Council on Disabilities policies and implementation and the consideration and the seamless guidelines for statistics using 1115 waivers. The last meeting, February 11, the list of things to focus on managed care was as follows, entrance in system, assessment, planning, support coordination, specific services, self-direction, and qualified providers, quality of services, advocate planning and transition and strategies, stakeholder engagement, aligning payment structure, protection and waiting list for programs like this. There will be future opportunities to participate in this process. Steve Strom: Thank you to Teresa Staley, you were a great participant. The twenty some odd folks gave great information of what works well and what didn’t work well. Go to our website www.nccdd.org for more information about each one of those thirteen areas mentioned. We’ve given that to DHHS as they have done their plan and submitted it to the general assembly regarding Medicaid reform. This first year of six meetings was simply to inform the writers of this plan. DHHS will need stakeholders to redefine or rewrite this plan in the fall. DSU Director’s Reports Vocational Rehabilitation, Mark Steele – I just passed out my quarterly report. Sorry for the lateness but all information was not available because of absences in our office. Does this report have all the information you want or need? I can get you any different information if needed. Some of our in house case status is on this report, I’d be happy to answer any questions about those. There are four areas listed, vehicle modifications, residence modification, assistive technology and durable medical equipment. These are areas that are one of our objectives in our SPIL and how we are meeting that need. This report talks about Money Follows the Person, 11 participants who made actual transitions during this quarter. There are several more in the process. We have Displacement Prevention fund that help fund 113 residence modifications. This is a pot of money that VRIL has through North Carolina housing agency allowing up to $6,000 for home modifications that is reimbursed back to VR. It helps allow our case service dollars to be used in other areas. The last item on the report is what the assistive technology has been doing the last quarter. Are there any questions? Division of Services for the Blind, Deidre Dockery – I am Santana filling in for Deidre, reporting the services provided thus far. To date we’ve served 1,055 clients, 326 under the age of 55; 326 and 729 who were 55 or older. 337 people were rehabilitated through mini centers and in home training. This fiscal quarter we trained 105 in mini centers; this is where we do a lot of skill building, teaching lessons etc. If there is any other information you would like I can take that request back to the office. Ex. Officio Reports Disability Rights NC – Mercedes Restucha-Klem I have been with Disability Rights for about 3 years, practicing employment law, architectural and employment access and voting rights I am the lead attorney on equal access to public accommodations. We submitted our litigation report and would be happy to answer all questions. Two I would like to highlight. Violation of due process was denied by DOT to consumers it is in the process of being briefed. The state has made a motion to dismiss but we are in the process to insure we can go into the discovery period. We’ve had an influx of about 30 people regarding the situation. Medicaid buy in for workers with disabilities that have been in place for years. HHS was not providing this and we are challenging that. We are in the discovery period of that case. If you know of anybody they can go to our website, a people with disabilities that are eligible for Medicaid. Please don’t hesitate to spread the word and have them contact us. There is no earned income limit for people with disabilities. Thank you for signing on to the Department of Transportation letter. We think the best approach is to tackle it at the planning process, they cannot deny knowledge down the road. Getting people with disabilities on local travel commission boards would be great. We recently had a meeting with governor health policy senior policy staff and general council about protecting the regulation that puts into place the North Carolina office of ADA 2007 was the last time it was actually staffed. The General assembly has passed a proposal to review the administrative code to repeal the one unnecessary. The first one under review is the one that creates and fund this ADA office. Two more things, we work under a grant for protection advocacy of voting, state is actively with new voting legislation has promoted and developed multi participant assistance team that go in to help facilities to assist in voting because of limitations in place for absentee voting. We’re hoping to encourage people to work with your local board of elections to be a member of these assistance teams. Last but not least we have our target center coming out for comment; we would love to get your input. Rene Cummins: I would like to applaud your efforts to look at the fact that we had an ADA office since the Rehab Act was passed. I know that the CILs get calls all the time looking for the state ADA Coordinator which there is none now. Keith Greenarch: How did you end up with the navigation of the Affordable Care Act? Mercedes: I didn’t work on that but those who were rushing around having appointments up to the very last minute. Council on Developmental Disabilities, Steve Strom We have been without an Executive Director. It will be taken up at the next council meeting anticipating a vote and hoping to have a new Executive Director by the first of July. We are currently working on a couple of initiatives. * Transitions from adult care homes/ nursing homes, we are working with Disability Rights North Carolina. This project will last for two more years. This is a pilot project, where we bring people out and develop a blue print for this process. The Department of Justice said to the state that they must do this for adults with mental illness backing it up with 39 million. The process will be very similar for a person with individuals with developmental disabilities, however people with individuals with developmental disabilities were not included in this Department of Justice settlement, therefore there is no push for the state to do this. We are looking at this project to see how well it works in conjunction with Department of Health and Human Services. Disability Rights is further ahead than what was anticipated and are “building the plane and flying it” at the same time. Great work is coming out of them. * We just got back with two of our self-advocates and two staff from the National Schooling Policy Conference in DC; there are lots of good things happening, Medicaid buy in and talk about where VR resides and what department, Department of Health and Human Services or Department of Labor. * We would love the council members that attended this conference to work with NCSILC to see if there are ways to correct the travel problems. Both wheel chair users had horrible experiences while traveling. One chair was broken and one was told that they would fly to the conference but not home. Attending this conference we had friends everywhere, we were able to get in touch with the correct people in the airlines, after fifteen phone calls. Both made it home but not without quite a bit of trouble. Education is needed at all levels in dealing with people with disabilities and their wheelchairs etc. * The council also released two RFAs and decisions will be made at the next council meeting for sibling support initiative up to 3 years and one on teaching financial literacy to people with individuals with developmental disabilities. * We are spending a lot of the council’s grants on transition services, transitions and developing assets and working on advocacy. Since the 70s the 2k asset limit is still the same * The next in it will be in guardianship; we will do a RFAs release sometime after May and make the announcement then. This will be started in early January. The point person would like to talk to anyone who is having guardianship issues. Keith Greenarch: When did your five year plan expire? Steve Strom: 2016 Keith Greenarch: Is there money available for grass roots org to have an IL Summit? Steve Strom: Part of our charge is to help support a statewide self-advocacy movement. We are currently funding Advocacy Ambassadors, working with Mike Mayer. There are four self-advocates, one from each area of the state. We are trying to identify what self-advocates are asking for so we can come back and offer recommendations to fund moving forward. Sierra and I talked a little bit about Youth Leadership Forum and there may be some potential there. Every meeting there is time for public comments. If there are areas that need to be addressed please come on Friday, May 16th and share. Rene Cummins: In regards to the travel problems, it is really important under the Air Carriers Access Act, that all who have bad experiences, report it to the toll free hot line provided by Department of Travel, (voice) 1-800-778-4838; (TTY) 1-800-455-9880. This number is a people with disabilities hotline for air passengers who experience problems. When called Department of Travel will contact the airlines and insist that they have training. The last big offender was American Airlines. Call the hotline, there is a procedure in place, so reporting is very important. Steve Strom: in making our phone calls found out that airlines are not under the Americans with Disabilities Act. They are under a different act. Mercedes Restucha-Klem: Every airport is supposed to have an Americans with Disabilities Act Coordinator, any airport staff is covered, but airlines and their employees are covered under the Air Carriers Access Act. That is a good place to take grievances but also take it to the local airports. Division of Services for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, Stephanie Johnson I did not get my report sent for sending out ahead of time. The equipment distribution services, it is in the process of bidding, the equipment that is currently available will be changing based on the bidding process. We will have to go with the lowest bid, you can anticipate some changes. The National deaf blind equipment distribution program which is a grant that the division has with FCC was originally set for a two year time period, this has been extended for an extra year. We are wrapping up the second year. Division of Services for the Blind and Division of Services for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing staff who have been doing assessments have been notified that all of this year’s referrals have to be completed by May 31. We have been able to secure the trainers who are now on contract. Equipment has been delivered to consumers who were in the first year of assessments. The trainers are going out to do the training. FCC rules with this grant do not allow for computer training, how to use the computer and with so many of the devices that the customers have applied for being computer based equipment, we are having to work with people that have never had a computer before to be trained outside of this program. The manager in the Raleigh center has retired as of March31. I am working to fill that position and also the position vacated in Wilson. One of the things we are getting ready for is Better Hearing and Speech Month in May. Our specialist are working specifically with veterans and getting the word out regarding our services, collaborating with local VA Administrations. May 29, in Salisbury at the VA hospital, they will hold an event with large numbers of attendees expected and a Veteran’s fair in Caswell County these events will be an opportunity to reach out to veterans. Client Assistance Program, Will Miller for John Marens – The written report was sent out in the EBlast. John asked that I share one story. A client of Vocational Rehabilitation requested assistance setting up an audio recording company through the small business program. He had a business plan but the problem was that he made a few comments about the type of books he wanted to record. Let’s just say they were a little dirty. He was sort of joking around but didn’t come across that way. It turns out that he had worked out deals with Amazon and other distributors but the state was concerned because while you don’t want to manage someone’s speech when you are providing funds, the problems it may create. Client Assistance Program got involved and negotiated an understanding between Vocational Rehabilitation and the client. It really wasn’t his intent to do dirty books, an agreement was reached. He is being supported and funded for his small business now providing books on audio. Old Business, New Business, Announcements, Public Comment Old Business: none New Business: none Announcements: Thank you for the setup of the meeting. Public Comment: Keith Greenarch: The meeting has been very productive. We will miss Jim Whalen, starting a new chapter in his life and we wish him the very best. Adjourned at 2:55 Next meeting is July18, 2014 Attendees: P = Present / T= attending by Teleconference / A = Absent Members Ex. Officio Guests Greenarch, Keith P Smith, Vicki A Santana Miller DSB P Bellamy, Gloria P Dockery, Deidre A Mercedes Restucha-Klem – Disability Rights P Cummins, Rene P John Marens A Steve Strom – DD Council P Lambert, Kimlyn A Mark Steele P Kelly Bowlander P Sinnott, Sandi A Stephanie Johnson P Arkeela Mitchell P Miley, Kay P CIL Directors Mike Ogburn P Staley, Teresa P Aaron Shabazz P Royster, Sierra P Jim Whalen P Sandra Hicks P Gloria Garton P Commander, Zach A Overfield, Jennifer P Staff/Support Ogburn, Sandy P Will Miller P Miller, Clare “Ping” P Debbie Hippler P Kaufman, Joshua P Kathleen Boate P Watkins, Oshana P Sarah Wheeler P McMillan, Sandy P Jamie Hill P Kincaid, Mitzi A 2 PA’s P FINAL 1