State Rep. Dan Miller, D-Allegheny, and Sen. Jay Costa, D-Allegheny, held a press conference on Friday, Aug. 9, 2024 in Pittsburgh to talk about the historic funding for intellectual disability and autism services that was included in the recently enacted Pennsylvania state budget. 

Click here to see the Press Conference from August 9, 2024

TRANSCRIPT: 
Thank you, and good morning.I am Representative Dan Miller.I want to welcome you to Mount Lebanon, here and to a very special home where a lot of great things happen.And we're here to talk about some of the wins that maybe didn't get all the attention that it should from this year's budget, which we very much appreciate.Governor Shapiro, Lieutenant Governor Davis, helping us get to a bipartisan budget that really accomplishes a lot and reflects the realities of Pennsylvanians, both on the political side and as far as keeping promises and building for tomorrow.Today we're here to talk with the ID/A community,which has been looking for a lot of help that needed to happen.And we're glad to report that a lot of help did happen.And these are good things.House and Senate Democrats, along with Governor Shapiro, have heard loud and clear the changes that need to be done to help good things happen and help, as I said, promises to be kept.This new state budget provides over $354 million in federal and state funding to improve the quality of life for individuals with autism and intellectual disabilities and provide much needed support,to direct support professionals who are crucial to their care.So very crucial to their care.That includes $280 million to help raise wages for direct support professionals, the DSPs, who are the backbone of the system.This historic investment, includes another $74 million to help clear the emergency waiting list,which is expected to help an estimated 1500 adults, to find community and home based support.Is that good? Yeah. All right, that's good.Thank you. I thought you I thought you were excited on that one.All right, that's good.This massive increase, in the state support, it builds on the 17 million we secured last year to also move this process forward.The funding is part of a multiyear strategy, to tackle the emergency waiting list.but we still have more work to be done.As of March, the emergency waiting list still had 6000 people waiting for those promises to be kept.Yeah. We must continue to work together.to address this backlog on that waiting list.And we also have to be sure that we are providing wages that keep not only great people here, providing the services that mean so much, but also be sure that the people can have the quality of life in doing so.These are integral jobs of DSPs, you know, and,to be honest, too much of the system had been dependent upon people being okay with accepting, too little of a wage.And they're right to say that this is not acceptable.The work is critical.It's life, changing and altering. And we have to be sure everybody can afford to do the job. With that, we're going to have a couple speakers here.I'm first going to kick it over to Karen Jacobsen,the CEO of Emmaus Community of Pittsburgh,whose home and house, and workers help provide the services that we're in.So, please, Karen, come on up.Thank you, Dan, and thank you for asking us to host the press conference here, in Mount Lebanon at one of our beautiful homes.Thank you, Senator Costa, for being here.and I thank my community for being here as well.Emmaus Community prides itself on providing high quality care where people with and without disabilities share our strengths and share our lives, and we walk the road of life together.Emmaus Community is one of hundreds of providers statewide.Providers strive to provide support for people with intellectual disabilities and autism in every aspect of their life, including residential homes, vocational programs, employment supports, behavioral supports, health care coordination, socialization, recreation, and skill building, all to ensure that individuals who need our support receive the services that they are given, that they need to ensure that their rights are the same rights as everyone else enjoys.For decades, this field has been woefully underfunded,which is part of the reason that Pennsylvania has such a long waiting list.But another reason that we struggle is because we simply don't have the workforce that we need to meet everyone else's needs.And the reason we don't have the workforce is because that employees struggle to make a living in this field because of the wages set by Medicaid rate structures and assumptions.But as Dan said, all of that is changing now.This year's state budget includes a lot more money for IDD than in past years.It's a tremendous step in the right direction.Representative Dan Miller, Senator Jay Costa, governor Josh Shapiro understand the importance and the value of this work,and they are leading the way and ensuring that the annual budget reflects those values.I want to thank my employees, especially the direct support professionals and frontline supervisors, for the excellent work that they do every day.And I invite anybody who's listening to consider a career in this fieldso that Pennsylvania can live up to its promise, supporting every individual with disabilities.Every citizen who has a disability can receive the support that they need and that they deserve.And I pray that Pennsylvania continues to increase the funding so that we can accomplish this mission.Lastly,I want to thank you, David, for sharing your home with us so we can have this press conference today.Thank you.Thank you. Thank you. yes. it's a great home, there's no doubt about it.Fantastic.And now we're going to, hear from a parent who's also been a long time advocate in this arena, Nancy Murray.So on behalf of families across the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania,we're here today to thank governor Josh Shapiro, the first governor in decades who listened to families and then took action.And thanks to Governor Shapiro, members of the legislature,two of the best leaders standing right behind me today, we accomplished something that about a year ago we never thought was possible.As you've heard, we have now 354 additional million dollars coming into our system.That will, in an immense way, help 1500 people right now who are desperately waiting for services on the emergency waiting list.It's also going to help us to start to increase wages for our direct support professionals who do amazing work each and every day.And for many people, these are, direct support professionals who really ensure, people's health and safety.They help to keep our children alive.To tell you the truth, in many instances,the other thing that we're going to be working on, in addition to, increasing the funding for year two of Josh Shapiro's multi-year growth strategy, is working on two pieces of legislation, one introduced by Representative Dan Miller, House Bill 661, the other introduced in the Senate with Senate Bill 864.And these bills are going to, for the first time, hopefully tie the reimbursement rates that providers need to actual, market conditions, including inflation.That's something that we've been working on now for a couple of years.And we're hoping that with the the energy from the governor's mansion and the state capitol this year, we're going to be able to see those things through.So thank you Thank you, Nancy.And as with so many things,there is, no progress, there is no budget successes that we have,without our good partnership with our friends in the Senate.and I know we're we're in Senator Fontana's district here,but we are very lucky to have the minority leader of the Senate, who is always caring about these issues.Senator Jay Costa with us here today.Thank you very much, Dan, and thanks, everyone, for being here today to really talk about this, really important subject that, quite frankly, as Representative Miller stated at the outset, didn't necessarily get the focus that it needed to in terms of the tremendous success that we talked about.When we talked about our budget.We certainly talked about the education funding.We talked about transportation and like and transit.But to me, the IDA money that is now coming to this Commonwealth, those state and federal, how important that is to be a part of the equation that's going to represent, think about 1500 homes just like this that will be impacted across our commonwealth with services from quality people who are professionals who are providing the services, who finally will be able to begin to receive a wage that's commensurate with the great work that they do and the manner in which they do, and the love that they share with the folks they work with.I'd be remiss if I didn't talk a little bit about how we got here.Representative Miller talked about, the collective work we've been able to do, but it's champions like Dan Miller who've been talking in this space, in this community, across this Commonwealth for,  for at least ten years now that I know of and want to say thank you to Dan for his work, and Nancy Murray, who I think she said she was retired, right.Hasn't retired.I've worked closely with Nancy for many, many years in this space.And I'm gonna throw a name out in addition to the work that you've done, the person who first brought up the role that IDA folks play, was Ray if you remember that name was very good friend and my home community.So, these are folks who have been at the forefront of this conversation for many, many years, and I'm happy to be here today to celebrate the success that this particular budget has provided to all of us in this community.Know that though this is a major first step,but it's not the only step, that there's more work to be done,certainly on the legislation, but also on the resources, and to make sure that we continue to make the investments we need to make to provide the services, but also equally important, to be able to provide the resources for the folks who provide that high quality, compassionate, professional care they provide to loved ones in our community.So I'm really pleased to be here.Thank you, and congratulations to everyone involved, for your advocacy.This is a testament to the work that you all have done in this community for many, many years.But we're not done.We got more work to do, and I'm looking forward to working, as they begin to prepare the next budget for ‘25-’26.Knowing that that conversation is going to start in the coming months, we're going to make certain that it continues to be at the forefront of what needs to be done.So thank you for having me. Thank you so much.You know, so look, as we've all mentioned here, there's a lot to talk about as success here.We also are aware of what we still need to do.And as Jay just mentioned and Nancy before too, we have the--there's nobody more positive than David.I'm telling you right now, I appreciate Dave.What's the metals you’ve got again?That’s pretty good. Is is gold?Gold silver. Gold and silver.That's pretty good, right? What do you guys think?Not bad?You got yours? At home.Okay, well that's okay.And look, we're just so glad that everybody was here today to help us talk about this. But it's great to talk about support, for the disability community, but it's more really, helpful, if you vote to provide it.And so that's what I know that our Senate friends, I know the House Democrats,it's a priority issue for us.We're glad to be working in a bipartisan fashion wherever possible,but we still have work that needs to be done.And there are still so many people, to be honest, the fact that a state is blessed as are, still carries with it thousands and thousands of people on a waiting list is a moral failure from our state.It's not acceptable.But in order for us to close that waiting list and end that waiting list, permanently end it, we have to be sure that staff are here, the workforce are here, and they can afford to do the job.And it has to be something sustainable as we create and have created a public private partnership of sorts to provide these services,then it's our responsibility to be sure the rates and wages that are there allow those services to be provided in the first place.That's a priority for both of our caucuses.That's what we still have to continue to build out.But we are very thankful for this step and for what Governor Shapiro's leadership did for us, so far.So with that, are there any questions for us today?What did you guys think?Do we do okay, what did you think? Did we do okay? What do you think, David? Yes. Everything okay? Yeah, it's all right.David, how do you think we did today?Yeah.It was 2001...I'll go. Whoa! The gold medal. Yes. And thank you.Thank you.And I know you're a big Batman fan.Oh, wow.I am...Well listen I appreciate you sharing that.Look, we've had a great time here, so we want to thank everybody.And with that, we'll conclude the press conference.Thank you very much. Thank you.