Case for Inclusion 2020 Finds Insufficient Investments Causing Stagnation in Outcomes for the Inclusion of People with Intellectual, Developmental Disabilities

This morning, the ANCOR Foundation’s Included. Supported. Empowered. campaign, along with our partners at United Cerebral Palsy, released the Case for Inclusion 2020 at a launch event at the National Press Club in Washington, DC.
 
The Case for Inclusion 2020 assesses all 50 states and the District of Columbia on 58 measures of how well state programs, primarily Medicaid, are supporting people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. This year’s report finds that although some states are seeing progress in their efforts to promote community inclusion, deeper investments in community-based supports are needed in order for people to live truly inclusive lives.
 
Among the key highlights of this year’s report, UCP and the ANCOR Foundation find that:

• The total number of people with I/DD on waiting lists for Home and Community Based Services (HCBS) increased by 49,000, from 424,000 in the last report to 473,000 in this year’s report. Ten states saw decreases in the number of people on their HCBS waiting lists, while 23 states saw their waiting lists grow.
• Nationally, the turnover rate for direct support roles was 43.8%. In large part, this can be explained by low median hourly wages for DSPs, which stood at just $12.09 nationally.
• The percentage of people with I/DD working in integrated employment—meaning they are leveraging supports to work alongside people without disabilities—creeped upward by just one percentage point, from 19% in the Case for Inclusion 2019 to 20% this year. Across the nation, there were 127,000 people with I/ DD working in competitive employment, up from 124,000 in last year’s report.
• There was an increase of two percentage points in the number of people with I/DD engaged in self-direction, from 11% in FY 2017 to 13% in FY 2018.

These high-level findings, along with comprehensive data for all 58 measures, can be found at the Case for Inclusion website, caseforinclusion.org.
 
In addition to the data, there are several resources for putting the data to work in service of your advocacy at the state and federal levels. The easiest way to get started is by visiting our Outreach Toolkit, which includes: 

• Social media content you can share with your networks as-is or customize to tell a story about your state.
• Shareable images that can help your audiences visualize the data.
• Links to related resources, including the Included. Supported. Empowered. Toolkit, which builds your capacity to tell stories that bring the data to life.
• Ideas for how to deepen your engagement with lawmakers, philanthropists and other key influencers.

In the coming days and weeks, we look forward to working with our partners at UCP and with you to bring visibility to these data, as they help illuminate the significant need for deeper investments in the ability of people of all abilities to live, work and thrive in the community. For all you do, thank you—we couldn’t do it alone!