As you may have read in the Federal Register or in media coverage of the announcement included in it last week, the Administration for Community Living has made some changes to our organization structure. This was done to better align missions and incorporate the Paralysis Resource Center and the State Health Insurance Assistance Programs (SHIP), which respectively moved from the CDC and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid to ACL earlier this year. This reorganization also will set the stage for success as we move programs from the Department of Education to ACL as part of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act over the next year.
Find the new ACL organization chart on this site. Specifically, here are the key elements of what the reorganization does:
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Replaces the Center for Disability and Aging Policy (CDAP) with the Center for Consumer Access and Self-Determination. This is our "middle center" — it sits between the aging and disability centers and handles the programs that address both portfolios. The SHIP will be housed here, as will the Senior Medicare Patrol (SMP) and Medicare Improvements for Patients and Provider Act (MIPPA) programs, bringing together three programs with a common focus on Medicare beneficiary education and outreach. This is also where the Lifespan Respite program and some of our other smaller integrated activities, such as the coordinated transportation and supported decision-making grants, will reside.
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Realigns ACL's existing policy development and program evaluation activities from CDAP to a newly created Center for Policy and Evaluation. This center will assume responsibility for evaluating ACL programs and reviewing departmental policies for their impact on older adults and people with disabilities.
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Locates the Paralysis Resource Center within the Administration for Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities’ Office of Innovation, which already administers the Help America Vote Act program that serves individuals with all types of disabilities.
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Moves the President’s Committee for People with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities to the Commissioner’s immediate office. This previously was a separate box in the Administration for Intellectual and Developmental Disability.
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Expands the Office of Elder Rights to become the Office of Elder Justice and Adult Protective Services. We recognize that APS spans both the aging and disability communities, and we will use the expertise developed in the elder justice area as a foundation for building the APS framework to serve all populations.
This new structure does not yet delineate where the programs that are moving under the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act will reside, but we believe the overall framework will provide logical places for those programs to fit.