Waiver waitlists are policy, not weather

Parents are told to join a list. Years pass. A child becomes an adult on the same list. Direct-support workers leave because the wage cannot rent an apartment near the people they serve. Officials describe this as a “workforce challenge,” as if no one sets rates.

Medicaid home- and community-based services are a state-federal bargain. Congress can attach incentives to shrinking waitlists. States can raise reimbursement and create career ladders. Both can publish list lengths by disability and age so the backlog cannot hide in averages.

APRC will treat waitlist reduction as a core voting issue in statehouses and a core appropriations issue in Washington. Families should not have to win a lottery to keep an adult child safe at home.

See our Medicaid plank →