Public Policy Commons^™

From The Director, Edmund Beard

New England Journal of Public Policy

Presents information on the Master of Science in Public Affairs graduate program and how this issue includes three of their best Case Studies of last year’s graduating class.

The Citizens Health Prescription: Coping With Rising Drug Costs, Shannon Cadres

New England Journal of Public Policy

Prescription drug prices have climbed to unaffordable levels in recent years, creating a serious public policy problem for lawmakers at both the state and federal levels. The U.S. Medicare program only covers the costs of inpatient prescription drugs, and only seventy-five percent of beneficiaries are receiving coverage through some other means. But because of the tremendous power of the pharmaceutical industry on Capitol Hill, lawmakers in Washington have been unable to agree upon a workable solution. As a result, many states are experimenting with different strategies to provide some relief. Massachusetts has attempted to solve the problem through the Prescription …

Tools For Inclusion: Evaluating Your Agency And Its Services: A Checklist For Job Seekers With Disabilities, Jaimie Ciulla Timmons, Melanie Jordan, David Hoff

Tools for Inclusion Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

It is important to evaluate employment services and decide if you are getting the results that you are looking for. You should have high expectations! If you are currently using an agency for help with employment, this checklist can help you make sure you are getting what you need.

Tools For Inclusion: Starting With Me: A Guide To Person-Centered Planning For Job Seekers, Melanie Jordan, Lara Enein-Donovan

Tools for Inclusion Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

A person-centered approach can help individuals with disabilities make satisfying job choices. This brief guides job seekers through a three-stage career development process that includes assessing their interests, researching the job market, and marketing themselves to potential employers.

Food Stamps: Available But Not Easily Accessible: A Study Conducted For Project Bread, Michelle Kahan, Elaine Werby, Jennifer Raymond

Center for Social Policy Publications

Concerned with growing hunger among Massachusetts families eligible for Food Stamps, and the paradoxical decline in the number of program enrollees, Project Bread asked the Center for Social Policy at the John W. McCormack Institute of Public Affairs, University of Massachusetts Boston (CSP) to study the process of securing and sustaining Food Stamp Benefits. Concurrent with the planning process for the study, the Massachusetts legislature, in an override of the Governor's veto in early December 2001, included language in the FY 2002 budget designed to expand access to the program. Among other requirements, the language requires the Department of Transitional …

The Paradox Of Public Authorities In Massachusetts: Massport And Masspike, Richard A. Hogarty

New England Journal of Public Policy

This case study provides historical context and fresh perspectives for those seeking to understand the ways in which independent authorities operate in Massachusetts. More specifically, it examines the controversial performances of two separate authorities that deal with transportation problems. One involves a failure to detect terrorists breaching security at Logan Airport; the other entails a bitter dispute that arose over the delay in raising tolls on the turnpike to pay for the Big Dig project. With both in mind, this study describes the countervailing pressures that converge on the executive branch of state government as it confronts the prospect of …

Rhode Island Latinos: A Scan Of Issues Affecting The Latino Population Of Rhode Island, Miren Uriarte, María Estela Carrión, Juan Carlos Gorlier, Charles Jones, Natalie Carithers, Juan Francisco García

Gastón Institute Publications

The Latino Population has grown dramatically in Rhode Island in the last two decades. This has been particularly the case in Central Falls and Providence where Latinos make up 48% and 30% of the population, respectively. This influx has created a shift in the racial/ethnic make up of these cities and in the cultural background of large sectors of the residents.

The arrival of large numbers of persons who do not speak English and who are not familiar with the structure and practice of public services would, under any circumstance, present a challenge. But the fact that they are recent …

Tools For Inclusion: From Stress To Success: Making Social Security Work For Your Young Adult, Danielle Dreilinger, Jaimie Ciulla Timmons

Tools for Inclusion Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

How does receiving Social Security affect families as their children move into adulthood? This brief shares families' experiences and suggests ways that families can manage SSI and use it to help a young adult prepare for their career.

Institute Brief: Developing Interagency Agreements: Four Questions To Consider, John Butterworth, Susan Foley, Deborah Metzel

The Institute Brief Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

Recent legislation emphasizes collaboration between state agencies. A good interagency agreement is one tool that can assist collaboration and promote systems change. Researchers offer four important considerations for an effective agreement and a worksheet for agency personnel.

Research To Practice: The Extent Of Consumer-Directed Funding By Mr/Dd State Agencies In Day And Employment Services, Deborah Metzel

Research to Practice Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

Individual control over service delivery and life choices is well established as a value in supports for individuals with developmental disabilities. One strategy for expanding choice is mechanisms that allow consumers to direct their funding. This brief reports on the prevalence of these options in state MR/DD agencies for 1999.

Research To Practice: Postsecondary Education As A Critical Step Toward Meaningful Employment: Vocational Rehabilitation's Role, Dana Scott Gilmore, Jennifer Bose, Debra Hart

Research to Practice Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

Research shows that access to postsecondary education makes an enormous difference in the employability of people with disabilities. This brief focuses on the rehabilitation outcomes of people who received education supports from Vocational Rehabilitation agencies.

Research To Practice: National Day And Employment Service Trends In Mr/Dd Agencies, Danielle Dreilinger, Dana Scott Gilmore, John Butterworth

Research to Practice Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

To what extent have changes in philosophy translated into changes for state agencies and the people they serve? This brief analyzes MR/DD agencies' day and employment service trends from 1988 to 1999 and discusses relevant trends in policy and legislation.

The Development Of Boston's Seaport District: Employment Opportunities And Community Strategies, O. Steven Quimby

Gastón Institute Publications

The development of Boston's Seaport District will create thousands of full-time employment opportunities over the next decade. To ensure equitable access to these opportunities for Boston's communities of color, it is imperative that organizations offering employment-training programs begin to take these opportunities into account now in their training efforts. The Center for Community Economic Development (CCED) at the University of Massachusetts Boston has prepared this report, The Development of Boston's Seaport District: Employment Opportunities and Community Strategies, as a step in becoming informed about these opportunities.

This study examines employment opportunities to be created in three industries projected to be …

Research To Practice: Effective Customer Service Delivery In Employment Support: Finding A Common Ground Between Guided And Self-Directed Service Delivery, Institute For Community Inclusion, University Of Massachusetts Boston

Research to Practice Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

An ICI study analyzed the experiences of individuals who successfully found jobs through agencies and discovered five characteristics of effective employment services. This brief describes guided and self-directed approaches and provides recommendations for agency staff.

Characteristics Of Effective Employment Services: The Consumers’ Perspective, Jaimie Ciulla Timmons, Jennifer Schuster, Doris Hamner, Jennifer Bose

All Institute for Community Inclusion Publications

This monograph reports on a study investigating the characteristics of effective state service systems. Findings are based on the experiences of individuals with disabilities who have used a state agency (Vocational Rehabilitation, Department of Mental Retardation, Department of Mental Health, or One Stop Center) to find employment. Interviews were conducted to examine individuals' experiences with employment services including job search, job entry, strategies that facilitated involvement, supports provided, and barriers experienced. Findings indicated five key components to effective service delivery, including agency culture, consumer-directedness, access to resources, quality personnel, and coordinated services. Obstacles faced during the employment process and personal …

Vocational Rehabilitation Outcomes For People With Mental Retardation, Cerebral Palsy, And Epilepsy: An Analysis Of Trends From 1985 To 1998, Dana Scott Gilmore, Jennifer Schuster, John Butterworth

All Institute for Community Inclusion Publications

This monograph presents the results of secondary analysis of the RSA-911 database from the Rehabilitation Services Administration. All successful VR closures for individuals with mental retardation, cerebral palsy, and epilepsy for six data points between 1985 and 1998 were investigated. Trends in competitive labor market and extended employment (sheltered workshops) closures were examined. The use of supported employment in the VR system and its outcomes were also discussed. Findings include increased incidence of competitive labor market closures and supported employment services, with a decrease in extended employment closures.

Comparisons of successful VR closure outcomes to trends in the general labor …

Research To Practice: Work Status Trends For People With Mental Retardation, Fy 1985 To Fy 1998, Dana Scott Gilmore, John Butterworth

Research to Practice Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

National trends regarding extended employment (sheltered workshops) and competitive employment outcomes from state Vocational Rehabilitation systems between 1985 and 1998.

Institute Brief: Wia And One-Stop Centers: Opportunities And Issues For The Disability Community, David Hoff

The Institute Brief Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

This brief gives a basic overview of the act and examines its impact on the lives of people with disabilities as well as the systems and organizations that assist them.

Research To Practice: Time Limits, Exemption, And Disclosure: Tanf Caseworkers And Clients With Disabilities, Jaimie Ciulla Timmons, Danielle Dreilinger

Research to Practice Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

Findings show that welfare caseworkers experience unique challenges when supporting welfare recipients with disabilities, including time limit pressures and conflict over exemptions. The brief includes a resource list for caseworkers.

Latino Agenda 2000, Leslie Bowen, Lillian Hirales, Mary Jo Marion, Giovanna Negretti, Andrés Torres

Gastón Institute Publications

Few would argue that our community's position is precarious. On the one hand, we are a growing presence in the Commonwealth. In 1995, there were an estimated 344,068 Latinos living in Massachusetts, representing 5.6% of the total state population, a 20% increase since 1990. It is expected that the 2000 census will confirm that Latinos are indeed the largest minority group in the state. Latinos make up an even larger proportion of the total population of a number of key cities, including Lawrence (48%), Chelsea (39%), Holyoke (37%), Springfield (20%), and Boston (12%). Latino youth have formed the largest minority …

Alternatives To Incarceration For Substance Abusing Female Defendants/Offenders In Massachusetts, 1996-1998, Carol Hardy-Fanta, Sylvia Mignon

Publications from the Center for Women in Politics and Public Policy

In July 1997, the Massachusetts State Legislature, recognizing the challenge presented by the problem of substance abuse for women in the criminal justice system, authorized funds to the Department of Public Health’s Bureau of Substance Abuse Services for a study of substance using female offenders to be conducted by the John W. McCormack Institute at the University of Massachusetts Boston. Since March 1998, a group of researchers at the McCormack Institute and the Criminal Justice Center at UMass Boston has gathered and analyzed a wealth of quantitative and qualitative information on women offenders in Massachusetts.

This information includes data from …

Research To Practice: Building A Future: Working With The Post-High School Expectations Of Students & Parents, Jennifer Schuster, Steven Graham, Mairead Moloney

Research to Practice Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

This brief examined the circumstances that accompany high expectations for the future for Massachusetts high school students who receive special education services and their parents. Includes recommendations on how to build and fulfill students' goals for adulthood.

Editor's Note, Padraig O'Malley

New England Journal of Public Policy

We are pleased to bring you the first issue of the New England Journal of Public Policy in the new century. We rejoice that at the stroke of midnight on December 31, 1999, the planet did not implode, meteors did not shower us with the debris of their displeasure with us earthlings, aircraft did not fall out of the sky, catastrophic convulsions in our ecosystems did not engulf us, telecommunication systems functioned with indifferent insouciance to the inner terrors of our crippled imaginations. The world, one minute after January 1, 2000, was yawningly the same as one minute before.

Whether …

Policy Brief: Provisions In The Workforce Investment Act Relating To Nondiscrimination On The Basis Of Disability And The Development By The Governor Of A Written Methods Of Administration, Robert Silverstein

Policy Briefs Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

An outline of key provisions in the interim final regulations describing the nondiscrimination and equal opportunity responsibilities of the governor, WIA fund recipients, and programs and activities that are part of the One-Stop system.

Tools For Inclusion: People With Disabilities: Having A Voice In The Creation Of The New Workforce Investment System, David Hoff

Tools for Inclusion Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

This publication informs people with disabilities and advocates about the opportunities available for input into WIA implementation at the state and local level.

Policy Brief: Improvements To The Ssdi And Ssi Work Incentives And Expanded Availability Of Health Care Services To Workers With Disabilities Under The Ticket To Work And Work Incentives Improvement Act Of 1999, Robert Silverstein

Policy Briefs Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

This brief gives background information on federal income maintenance and health care programs, and describes the major provisions of the Ticket to Work and Work Incentives Improvement Act.

Tools For Inclusion: One-Stop Centers: A Guide For Job Seekers With Disabilities, Sheila Fesko, David Hoff, Melanie Jordan

Tools for Inclusion Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

General information about the One-Stop system and answers to specific questions individuals with disabilities may have about One-Stop services.

Policy Brief: The Ticket To Work And Self-Sufficiency Program And Established Under The Ticket To Work And Work Incentives Improvement Act Of 1999, Robert Silverstein

Policy Briefs Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

A description of the major provisions in Title I of the Act, which created the Ticket to Work and Self-Sufficiency Program.

Tools For Inclusion: Helpful Hints: How To Fill Out A Winning Pass Application, Jaimie Ciulla Timmons, Steven Graham

Tools for Inclusion Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

This brief uses the story of one career woman to illustrate how to apply for and use a PASS (Plan for Achieving Self Support), a Social Security program that allows people receiving SSI to maintain benefits as they start working.

Tools For Inclusion: Understanding The Ssi Work Incentives, John Butterworth

Tools for Inclusion Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

Information about Social Security Administration programs that can help people who receive Supplemental Security Income (SSI) to retain benefits that can support and ensure long-term employment.