Mr. OWENS. Thank you. Mr. JEFFORDS. Thank you, Rick. I deeply appreciate it. I must say that just attending one of the awards ceremonies you have had for businesses who have participated in the supported employment program, and listening to the stories in Vermont of those that had been employed, was a very, very rewarding experience, and I deeply thank you. Unfortunately, I have another commitment to attend at this point, Mr. Chairman. Mr. OWENS. Mr. Gary Cook, the Executive Director, Occupational Center of Central Kansas. STATEMENT OF MR. GARY COOK, DIRECTOR, OCCUPATIONAL CENTER OF CENTRAL KANSAS, INC. Mr. Cook. Good morning-or afternoon, I guess, at this point. Mr. Chairman, I am the Executive Director of the Occupational Center of Central Kansas in Salina, Kansas, referred to as OCCK in the rest of my testimony. of Mr. OWENS. It would be good if you could keep the mike in front you, unless you are a salesman, too. Mr. Cook. Okay. I'm not. I am here to tell you this morning about the experiences we have had with supported employment in Salina, providing services as a facility. I am also here as a representative of the National Association of Rehabilitation Facilities, I will refer to as NARF. NARF represents over 700 rehabilitation facilities around the country providing a wide range of vocational and medical services to persons with severe disabilities. I serve on the NARF board of directors and also chair the supported employment task force for NARF. Our facility provides services grouped in three primary areaschildren's developmental services, community services, and vocational services. I want to mention a little bit about the community services. They include our Independent Connection Program, which provides case coordination, information and referral, independent living skills training, transportation accessibility guides, interpreting services, advocacy, and apartment support living. I wanted to mention those because I feel that even though we are talking about vocational programs, those are very important support services that must be provided to supported employment and other types of vocational services. Our vocational services include vocational evaluation, work activity, work adjustment, and alternative employment. This afternoon I want to talk about the supported employment aspects of our vocational program, and I would like to emphasize that we have used supported employment as a mode of delivering a variety of vocational services, not as a separate program. I believe in the previous testimony given by the Assistant Secretary, she referred to it being one of the mix of services available, that must be made available under the rehabilitation services. At OCCK we have been using community job sites and needed support services as a means of providing for severely disabled persons for several years now. This predated the emphasis on supported employment at the Federal level. The supported employment approach is used for work adjustment training, work services, and competitive placement. Currently approximately half the persons with disabilities working or placed into employment by OCCK are as a result of the supported employment efforts. Supported employment efforts at OCCK currently include a variety of sites, using individual competitive site placement, individual placement in the manufacturer's site, enclaves, and affirmative industries and mobile work crews. There is information in the testimony in terms of the number of people being served by those various programs at OCCK. OCCK's funding for supported employment services has come from a variety of sources. Mainly, however, our support for that program over a period of time has come from mill levy income generated by the county and from business income generated by the services we provide to business and industry. Your staff has asked me to tell you how supported employment will benefit persons with disabilities. The answers are simple. The number of hours of work available for the worker are increased, the hours are more consistent, the earnings are somewhat improved and, most importantly, the self-image of the worker is substantially improved. The major factor contributing to the success of supported employment at the local level is acceptance by the local business community. This is true no matter what model of supported employment you may be using or what disabilities the workers have or how severely disabled the workers are. This is the main reason we feel that supported employment sponsored by community-based rehabilitation facilities should be a primary means of providing supported employment. Rehabilitation facilities are looked at as fellow businesses by the local business community. The ideal goal is to be able to have all the persons that we serve with disabilities working in jobs in the setting that they choose. There are, however, impediments to that. The three major impediments that delay or prevent supported employment, from our perspective, are the attitudes of parents, staff, our boards, and local businesses; two, the early negative attitude of some Federal officials towards rehabilitation facilities and the VR program, when they were labeled as part of the problem rather than part of the solution; and, three, the lack of long-term Federal support. Parents' concerns include the impact on SSI and SSDI and other benefits, the disruption of the status quo when things are otherwise going well for their son or daughter, and the fear of an unknown future. While the situation with SSI has improved considerably with Section 1619, the impact of higher earnings on SSDI recipients will continue to be a problem for the implementation of supported work for some individuals. Some early proponents of supported employment on the Federal level criticized sheltered employment, especially work activities centers, in order to justify a new program: supported employment. There was an assumption that rehabilitation facilities were fighting against working with more severely disabled persons or in providing jobs in the community rather than in the sheltered workshop. In reality, sheltered workshops had developed many of the work models now being used for supported employment. Facilities have the relationship with the disabled individual and their family, the staff, and credibility with the business community to make the services happen. Currently we are depending upon county mill levy funds and our own resources-I am speaking individually as an agency-to pay for ongoing services. What is needed is assurance that there will be a stable source of funding for these services that can follow the individual to keep them on the job and to help in moving them to other jobs, as will almost certainly be needed in the future. I hope Congress will recognize the need and look at entitlement programs such as SSI, SSDI, and Title 19 waivers as potential funding sources. The national staff at OSERS has been very supportive of supported employment, almost to the exclusion of other programs and initiatives at the Federal level. Too much time has been spent recently on disputes between the Assistant Secretary's office and the Commissioner of RSA's office. Rehabilitation facilities have had a long and productive relationship with the Commissioner. He was responsible for revitalizing that important means of communication between facilities and the Federal level. We hope that Commissioner Dart will be allowed to exercise the authority he has been given under the Rehabilitation Act. What is needed from the Department of Education is positive reinforcement that the VR system and community based rehabilitation facilities can and do play an important role in the provision of supported employment. Apprehensions of community facilities include the following: what will happen to capital assets, such as buildings and equipment, that are currently used for supported employment; questions of future income resources; needed alternatives-not all persons will need or be qualified for supported employment; lack of client referrals to existing successful programs. These legitimate fears and apprehensions need to be addressed for all rehabilitation facilities to feel that supported employment is a program that they need to be a real part of. What does the supported employment program need to do to realize its full potential? The following in summary. Mr. Chairman, I want to quickly review the things I think supported employment needs to realize that potential: better utilization of community rehabilitation facilities; full and fair fee for service; identifying sources of long-term support. Thank you for this opportunity to testify before the subcommittee. I will be glad to answer any questions you might have. [The prepared statement of Gary T. Cook follows:] |