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Legislative Network Alerts Alert Number 138 September 26, 2005 For Your Information House Introduces Hurricane Katrina Legislation To: Members of the Legislative Network From: Patricia Leahy, Director of Governmental Affairs For those who read on the run, this legislative update deals with the introduction of H.R. 3864, to provide vocational rehabilitation services (SPECIFICALLY with regard to REALLOTMENT FUNDS and State match) to individuals with disabilities affected by Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Rita. This legislative update will also forward an URGENT request from Dr. Margaret Giannini, Director of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office on Disability regarding the location of hurricane survivors who were placed nursing homes and other restrictive facilities. Late last week, Congressman Boustany (R.LA.), who serves on the House Education and the Workforce Committee, introduced H.R. 3864, 'Assistance for Individuals with Disabilities Affected by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita Act of 2005.' This bill is the companion bill to S. 1715, which was introduced last week by Senator Mike Enzi (R.WY.) and Senator Edward Kennedy (D.MA.), Chairman and Ranking Democratic Member, respectively, of the Senate HELP Committee and on which we reported last week in our last Washington Wire. Like S. 1715, H.R. 3864, which follows immediately below for your information, deals specifically with the priority distribution of VR's reallotment funds and waiving State match requirements in those affected States for this SPECIFIC purpose. Both bills are on a very fast track through their respective Bodies, with the Senate bill hopefully being 'hotlined' sometime today for expedited action in the Senate and in the House the bill being brought under 'Suspension of the Rules' ASAP for expedited action in the House. Both bills, which are similar, but not identical, must be quickly conferenced, with a Conference Report emerging that must be identical for both Houses of Congress before the Conference Report to accompany these bills can be brought to the respective Floors for final passage before being sent to the President for signature. Conference Reports, as you may know, cannot be amended on either Floor of Congress and as we said, must be identical. We will keep you advised as reliable, additional information becomes available to us in this regard. With the end of the fiscal year looming (September 30, 2005), the plan at this time is to have this legislation (the Conference Report) passed on both Floors and sent to the President for his signature on or preferably before September 30, 2005. All information on the legislative timing of these bills is current as of this time and date and could change quickly. Text of HR 3864 109TH CONGRESS 1ST SESSION H. R. To provide vocational rehabilitation services to individuals with disabilities affected by Hurricane Katrina or Hurricane Rita. IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES Mr. BOUSTANY introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on A BILL To provide vocational rehabilitation services to individuals with disabilities affected by Hurricane Katrina or Hurricane Rita. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa- 1 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 3 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Assistance for Individ- 4 uals with Disabilities Affected by Hurricanes Katrina and 5 Rita Act of 2005’’. 6 2 SEC. 2. REALLOTMENT OF AMOUNTS UNDER TITLE I OF 1 THE REHABILITATION ACT OF 1973. 2 (a) REALLOTMENT OF AMOUNTS.—In realloting 3 amounts to States under section 110(b)(2) of the Rehabili- 4 tation Act of 1973 (29 U.S.C. 730(b)(2)) for fiscal year 5 2005, the Commissioner of the Rehabilitation Services Ad- 6 ministration shall give preference to affected States. 7 (b) AVAILABILITY OF AMOUNTS.—For fiscal year 8 2005, the Commissioner shall make available amounts re- 9 allotted under section 110(b)(2) of the Rehabilitation Act 10 of 1973 to any State not later than October 7, 2005, or 11 seven days after the date of the enactment of this Act, 12 whichever occurs later. 13 (c) WAIVER OF NON-FEDERAL SHARE REQUIRE- 14 MENT.—The Commissioner may waive the requirement 15 contained in the second sentence of section 110(b)(2) of 16 the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (relating to non-Federal 17 share requirement) with respect to amounts made avail- 18 able to an affected State for fiscal year 2005 if the af- 19 fected State submits to the Commissioner an application 20 requesting a waiver of such requirement. 21 SEC. 3. USE OF AMOUNTS REALLOTTED UNDER TITLE I OF 22 THE REHABILITATION ACT OF 1973. 23 An affected State that receives amounts reallotted 24 under section 110(b)(2) of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 25 3 (29 U.S.C. 730(b)(2)) for fiscal year 2005 (as described 1 in section 2) may use the amounts— 2 (1) to pay for vocational rehabilitation services 3 (which may include training, mentoring, or job shad- 4 owing opportunities) for individuals with disabilities 5 affected by Hurricane Katrina or individuals with 6 disabilities affected by Hurricane Rita that con- 7 tribute to the economic growth and development of 8 communities; 9 (2) to enable— 10 (A) individuals with disabilities affected by 11 Hurricane Katrina to participate in reconstruc- 12 tion or other major disaster assistance activities 13 in the areas in which the individuals resided on 14 August 22, 2005; 15 (B) individuals with disabilities affected by 16 Hurricane Rita to participate in reconstruction 17 or other major disaster assistance activities in 18 the areas in which the individuals resided on 19 the date that is seven days before the date on 20 which the President has declared that a major 21 disaster related to Hurricane Rita exists in 22 such areas; or 23 4 (3) to carry out other activities in accordance 1 with title I of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (29 2 U.S.C. 720 et seq.). 3 SEC. 4. DEFINITIONS. 4 In this Act: 5 (1) AFFECTED STATE.—The term ‘‘affected 6 State’’ means a State that contains an area, or that 7 received a significant number of individuals who re- 8 sided in an area, in which the President has declared 9 that a major disaster exists. 10 (2) COMMISSIONER.—The term ‘‘Commis- 11 sioner’’ means the Commissioner of the Rehabilita- 12 tion Services Administration. 13 (3) INDIVIDUAL WITH A DISABILITY.—The term 14 ‘‘individual with a disability’’ has the meaning given 15 the term in section 7(20) of the Rehabilitation Act 16 of 1973 (29 U.S.C. 705(20)). 17 (4) INDIVIDUAL WITH A DISABILITY AFFECTED 18 BY HURRICANE KATRINA.—The term ‘‘individual 19 with a disability affected by Hurricane Katrina’’ 20 means an individual with a disability who— 21 (A) resided on August 22, 2005, in an 22 area in which the President has declared that 23 a major disaster related to Hurricane Katrina 24 exists in such area; 25 5 H.L.C. (B) on August 22, 2005, was eligible 1 under title I of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 2 (29 U.S.C. 720 et seq.) for vocational rehabili- 3 tation services described in section 103 of the 4 Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (29 U.S.C. 723) in 5 the area described in subparagraph (A); and 6 (C) resides in an area in which the Presi- 7 dent has declared that an emergency exists, in 8 accordance with section 501 of the Robert T. 9 Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assist- 10 ance Act (42 U.S.C. 5191), related to Hurri- 11 cane Katrina, or in which a major disaster re- 12 lated to Hurricane Katrina exists. 13 (5) INDIVIDUAL WITH A DISABILITY AFFECTED 14 BY HURRICANE RITA.—The term ‘‘individual with a 15 disability affected by Hurricane Rita’’ means an in- 16 dividual with a disability who— 17 (A) resided in an area on the date that is 18 seven days before the date on which the Presi- 19 dent has declared that a major disaster related 20 to Hurricane Rita exists in such area; 21 (B) on the date described in subparagraph 22 (A), was eligible under title I of the Rehabilita- 23 tion Act of 1973 (29 U.S.C. 720 et seq.) for vo- 24 cational rehabilitation services described in sec- 25 6 H.L.C. tion 103 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (29 1 U.S.C. 723) in the area described in subpara- 2 graph (A); and 3 (C) resides in an area in which the Presi- 4 dent has declared that an emergency exists, in 5 accordance with section 501 of the Robert T. 6 Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assist- 7 ance Act (42 U.S.C. 5191), related to Hurri- 8 cane Rita, or in which a major disaster related 9 to Hurricane Rita exists. 10 (6) MAJOR DISASTER.—The term ‘‘major dis- 11 aster’’ means a major disaster declared by the Presi- 12 dent in accordance with section 401 of the Robert 13 T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assist- 14 ance Act (42 U.S.C. 5170) related to Hurricane 15 Katrina or Hurricane Rita. 16 END Secondly and equally important, we are attaching an URGENT request by the Department of HHS on assistance in locating hurricane survivors who were placed in nursing homes and other restrictive facilities. As this URGENT alert states: 'We are all aware that people were transferred from many shelters to nursing homes and institutions across the U.S. over the past four weeks, but there are NO RECORDS of who those people are or where they went. HHS is enlisting our help so that can work with HUD to get these folks back out of the nursing homes and into temporary housing in the community. Nursing homes have 90 days to bill for their care so its not likely these people can be trackded through nursing home census data at this time. Please see the attached URGENT alert from Justice For All, which follows below. -----Original Message----- From: Justice For All Moderator [mailto:jfa@jfanow.org] Sent: Sunday, September 25, 2005 1:19 PM To: justice@jfanow.org Subject: Urgent Request From The Us Department Of Health And Human Services - Please Forward Urgent Request From The Us Department Of Health And Human Services - Please Forward Dr. Margaret Giannini, Director of the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office on Disability needs our help to locate hurricane survivors who were placed in nursing homes and other restrictive facilities. We are all aware that people were transferred from many shelters to nursing homes and institutions across the US over the past four weeks, but there are no records of who these people are or where they went. HHS is enlisting our help so they can work with HUD to get these folks back out of the nursing homes and into temporary housing in the community. Nursing homes have 90 days to bill for their care so its not likely these people can be tracked through nursing home census data at this time. Please include all people who were previously in community based residential settings like group homes, in addition to those who were living independently who were placed in ICFs and SNFs anywhere across the country. Early reports indicate that people were scattered broadly in reopened institutions, empty nursing home beds and other restrictive environments. We have their attention and we are in a position to insure that no one gets left behind. As solutions are created for hurricane survivors, so can those solutions work for others! Please send specific information about hurricane survivors who you know to be in nursing homes, institutions and all other examples that would indicate that someone was evacuated or transferred to a restrictive environment. This is also a good opportunity to keep the focus on many, many other who have been waiting for community based services for years. Please send all information to: margaret.giannini@hhs.gov, and please cc mroth@spinalcord.org by COB on Monday, September 26th. Please continue to send information after that deadline, but do not delay sending what you do know now because a report will be sent tomorrow at COB with temporary housing discussions beginning immediately. Thank you! Marcie Roth Marcie Roth Executive Director/CEO National Spinal Cord Injury Association 6701 Democracy Blvd Suite 300-9 Bethesda, MD 20817 (301) 717-7447 (Direct) (301) 214-4006 (VM) (301) 963-1265 (Fax) (800) 962-9629 (Helpline) mroth@spinalcord.org www.spinalcord.org # # # -- DISCLAIMER: The JFA Listserv is designed to share information of interest to people with disabilities and promote dialogue in the disability community. Information circulated does not necessarily express the views of AAPD. 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