ROUGH EDITED COPY

ICI-UMB
IMPROVING BUSINESS ENGAGEMENT AND CONSUMER OUTCOMES THROUGH REDESIGN OF MAINE'S COMMUNITY REHABILITATION 
PROVIDER (CRP) SYSTEM
SEPTEMBER 18, 2018
1:00 P.M. ET

CART PROVIDED BY:
ALTERNATIVE COMMUNICATION SERVICES, LLC
www.CaptionFamily.com

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This is being provided in a rough-draft format.  Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) is provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings.  
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	>> DeBRITTANY MITCHELL:  Good afternoon and welcome my name is DeBrittany Mitchell I'm a knowledge translation associate for the Institute for Community Inclusion today the Department of Recommendations will be present about their job-driven project before we get started with today's webinar I want to run through some items as participants you are all automatically muted you don't have to worry about finding the mute button for those new to Zoom you'll find a bar at the bottom or top of your screen that will allow you to add the chat box to your view.  In the chat box you can leave comments or ask questions.  
	Please be sure to select all panelists and attendees from the blue drop-down so the entire group can see your comments and questions.  You can enter your questions and comments throughout the discussion and we will address them at the end of the presentation.  If you experience any difficulties today using this platform please note those in the chat box and I'll do my best to assist you.  
	Also today's Panel Discussion is being live captioned.  The URL to access that is posted in the chat box, as well.  
	The webinar is also being recorded today and the archiving will be posted on the explore VR Web site which can be found at www.exploreVR.org tomorrow you will receive a link to a survey about this webinar if you're a certified rehabilitation counselor seeking credits for completing this webinar you must complete the survey please note it can take up to six weeks to receive the credit without further ado I would like to hand it over to Linda Mock who will be introducing today's presenters.  
	>> LINDA MOCK: Thank you, DeBrittany.  And good morning or good afternoon depending on where you are in the country as you join us we're excited that you are with us today.  As DeBrittany you'll be hearing from Maine who did a project redesigning their CRP system in order to improve their business engagement and consumer outcomes.  Before we get started I wanted to just give a brief background on the JD-VRTAC.  We have had the goal of improving the skills of State Vocational Rehabilitation Agency staff as well as other professionals and providers of VR services who are providing services in what we call the job-driven area of VR who works with people with disabilities, businesses and does customer training providers we have been focusing on four topical areas.  
	Those are business engagement, employer supports, labor market information and customized training.  
	We have had a number of partners who have been a part of the JD-VRTAC.  We are a part of the Institute for Community Inclusion at the University of Massachusetts Boston.  Our other partners are Jobs for the Future, the University of Arkansas, the University of Washington, the Council of State Administrators of Vocational Rehabilitation, the United States Business Leadership Network.  The Association of University Centers on Disabilities, as well as the National Council of State Agencies for the Blind and the Technical Assistance Center Collaborative.  
	With that information as a background, I want to turn today's presentation over to two representatives that we have with us today from Maine.  We have Libby Stone-Sterling who is the director of the Maine Division of Vocational Rehabilitation Services  And Christine Robinson who is the director of systems improvement and quality assurance.  
	And with that I'm going to turn it over to Libby and Chris.  
	>> LIBBY STONE-STERLING:  Good afternoon, everyone, this is Libby and I'm here with.
	>> CHRISTINE ROBINSON:  Chris Robinson  Good afternoon, everybody
	>> LIBBY STONE-STERLING:  And we're very excited to be sharing with you our work with the JD-VRTAC project thank you, Linda, for that introduction.  And also it was very nice recently to see so many of the JD-VRTAC participants in Bethesda.  It was a great learning opportunity.  And we know here in Maine we took away a lot of great information from that event so today I'll share where we are and I will say we are very much a work in progress as you hear us talk today you will see there are places we are still very much in development  So there may be things you might want to share with us in terms of ideas or suggestions for us, as well.  And we would certainly welcome that in the chat box as we go forward.  
	So when we started this project, we were with JD-VRTAC to address a number of different project objectives.  We wanted to look at our CRP expenditures, which were quite high.  Our Community Rehab Provider expenditures.  We also wanted to improve the number and quality of employment outcomes for consumers served by those CRPs.  We were concerned, also, about moving consumers into employment in a timely place and we also wanted to look across our agency to have more of a state-wide approach to business engagement and oftentimes that means working very closely with our Community Rehab Providers and we wanted to look at how we could improve the availability of job rehab places around the state so that was the start as we began this work together.  
	One piece that was very important for us in all the work that we do is really making sure we have good stakeholder involvement.  In this case we worked very closely with Community Rehabilitation Providers.  We had a Steering Committee that included many of them on that group.  
	We also worked with our state rehabilitation counselors both our state vocational rehabilitation and also other sister agency the d we were working and planning our CRP work and also PABSS here in Maine supported through Disability Rights Maine.  And over the last ten years we have really been working at this issue of CRP payment structure.  And really trying to come up with a model that both met our needs, met our client needs, and also was something that worked for our Community Rehabilitation Providers.  So this has been something we really say a work in progress.  We can really say it's been the last ten years that we've been addressing this issue.  And I will share with you how we were able to move along over those years.  We have a very strong long-standing partnership with the Maine Department of Health and Human Services both the Office of Substance abuse and Mental Health Services, the Office of Aging and Disabilities Services and the Office of Child and Family Services.  
	So we wanted to make sure that whatever work we were doing here in Maine also lined up with the work that they are doing at the Department of Health and Human Services around people with disabilities and employment.  Here at the Department of Health and Human Services and the Maine Bureau of Rehabilitation Services we work to jointly fund additional benefit specialists, community work incentive coordinators.  We jointly funded the employment workforce development system to help through professional development for individuals who are working in the employment system.  
	And have the same requirements between the Department of Health and Human Services and the Bureau of Rehabilitation Services for employment service providers such as CRPs, employment specialists and job coaches.  And this is very important so that we're aligning our expectations across systems.  
	Now I'll turn it over to Chris to give you some of the timeline and the background.
	>> CHRISTINE ROBINSON:  So this slide gives you a timeline for the work we have been doing on CRP payment revisions and also served somewhat as a timeline for the JD-VRTAC project as Libby said for at least ten years we've been looking at the CRP payment system and making some adjustments.  
	So up until state Fiscal Year 2013 we were working with the fee-for-service structure.  And were wanting as a system to move more closely to an outcome-based payment system.  So we did a gradual rollout of that milestone or outcome based payment system over state Fiscal Year 2013 gradually rolling it out across the state.  So state Fiscal Year 2014 was the first full year that the milestone system was in place  We will provide more details on how that went in just a moment.  But how it went caused us to contact JD-VRTAC that they essentially had their first site visit here in Maine of June of 2016.  After a lot of discussion a lot of work with stakeholders, et cetera, we rolled out a new what we call hybrid system on October 1, 2016, did some revisions to that in February of 2017 and we'll be giving you more details about all of this.  And then ultimately decided that we were going to go out with a Request for Proposal for CRP services due out in late summer, which would be now.  And we will be telling you much more about that in just a moment.  
	>> LIBBY STONE-STERLING:  So a little bit more detail about the milestone system.  Progress the slide.  There we go.  
	A little bit more detail about the milestone system.  We had that system for about three and a half years.  And as you can see from this grid, it was a two tiered system meaning Tier 1 was a payment system that applied to the most significantly disabled OOS 1 clients and Tier 2 applied to OOS 2 and 3.  So there were all of these milestones in which we would be providing payment to CRPs.  As you can see, the first was once they had met with the client, established a plan for an employment search that they were both in agreement with, that would be milestone No 1.  Milestone No. 2 would be once they had been placed in a job and completed one workday successfully.  Milestone 3 would be 45 calendar days successfully in employment.  Then Milestone 4 would be when they were eligible for successful VR closure.  
	In addition to that, the CRPs would be eligible for a bonus payment of $1,000 regardless of which tier the client fit into.  Once the recipient SSI or SSDI recipient were at the SGA learning level.  
	In addition to that, we had a couple other subsidies.  One was we had some pockets of the state where we really had very little coverage because they were tough to get to or for any number of reasons.  So for Community Rehab Providers who agreed to serve those particular underserved areas, there was a 15% addition to the fee.  
	And we also have a 15% subsidy for CRP providers who are proficient in ASL or in proficient in a foreign language.  Generally speaking when the outcome payment system was rolled out, the larger CRPs were quite fond of it  The smaller CRPs, especially the one or two-person shops less so.  Because they had some cash flow concerns.  
	So how did the milestone system payment work out?  
	These are some numbers that partially tell the story.  The two rows that are highlighted in yellow are the two full years of the milestone system.  So the top row, 2012 was premilestone.  And the bottom, 2016 and 2017 were when we moved to the hybrid system.  
	So just looking at the two highlighted years for a moment, you'll see that in 2014 when you look at successful closures associated with CRPs, that went up.  From 256 to 357.  Also overall total successful closures went up in 2014 to 1010 from 778.  And while overall CRP expenditures went up, the average cost for closure went down pretty significantly.  So that was a pretty fortuitous start to the milestone system.  
	But when you look at the second full year of implementation of the milestone system, things were changing a bit.  You'll see that the successful closures associated with CRPs went down.  Roughly 100.  The overall number of total successful closures didn't change all that much.  It did go up a little bit.  But you'll notice if you go over to the far right column, that the average cost per closure went up significantly.  From 9700 to 14,400.  
	So -- excuse me; let me just take a drink.  
	So that was causing some concern.  And we started looking at those numbers pretty closely.  
	So that was when we then moved on to the hybrid system, which was rolled out in October 1, 2016.  And these are some details about the hybrid system.  I don't want to go into too much detail about every single service.  But essentially the reason why we're calling it a hybrid system is because it was a combination of an hourly fee-for-service as well as some bonus payments, which we will get into in just a moment.  
	But when we went to the hybrid system, we wanted to make sure that we were really clear about what the service was that we were purchasing.  And what the hourly fee was  So we made a point of making sure that those service definitions were out there so that there was no miscommunication or misunderstanding between the VR counselor and the CRP.  
	So if you look at this second slide about the hybrid system, this explains a bit more about the bonus system.  So we are on a fee-for-service system.  But there are also some incentives for getting people to employment in a timely manner  So this again is regardless of whether it's -- regardless of OOS status.  So there's no longer a Tier 1 and Tier 2.  
	So if an individual is successfully employed anywhere from 0 to 90 days from the referral date specifically for job development or customized employment, then the CRP is paid a bonus of $750 upon successful closure.  And if that timeline is 91 to 180 days from referral date for job development for customized employment, then the bonus is $500.  And we also maintained the bonus payment of $1,000 when an SSI or a DI recipient reaches SGA earning level.  
	So taking another look at how the hybrid system worked out.  This is a subset of the table that we were looking at in a previous slide showing milestones and before and after.  So when you look at these numbers, you will see that you'll see that the total number of successful closures from 2016 to 2017 went down significantly.  You'll also see the average cost for closures associated with CRPs remained roughly the same.  
	But The total closures went from 752 to 342 so can you -- we have now been under the hybrid system just show of two years it started October 1, 2016.  There are a couple of things to keep in mind when looking at this data.  One is the hybrid system would be introduced at the same time right at the same time we were rolling out the WIOA provisions so increasing our services to youth and having less of a focus on successful closures.  
	And also the good news is that the economy has been very good in recent years  And we've got a very low unemployment rate in Maine and really across the country.  So looking at these numbers, it seems that many people are getting jobs on their own if they are able to do so rather than applying to VR.  So the folks with more significant disabilities and perhaps needing more assistance in finding employment make up a larger percentage of our client base.  
	Perhaps one of the most significant issues that we experienced with the hybrid system is that a number of Community Rehab Providers decided to get out of the employment business.  So if you look at these numbers, they are really rather startling.  Because the number of contracts we had with Community Rehab Providers went from 59  in 2015 down to 41 currently.  In some cases that was as a result of some smaller or maybe not even smaller CRPs merging.  But in the majority of cases, it was CRPs just saying that they are getting out of the employment business.  
	The reasons that they cited were many.  But the majority of those agencies talked about how difficult it was to hire and keep qualified staff, which to some extent is a reflection of the economy and the low unemployment rate.  And of course hiring new staff takes time and takes money.  But they were also just saying in general that overall employment services were not working for them from a financial perspective for the agency.  
	So what we're facing right now is kind of a patchwork of services across the state.  There are some areas where we have no CRPs  Others where we only have one.  
	We've talked to a lot of CRPs that have said, well, you know, I'll do job development in the area but I won't do job coaching because I don't have the staff.  Or I'll serve -- I'll do job development in Bangor but can't serve five miles outside of there.  
	So we're really in a situation that's not sustainable and we really need to take a look at how do we get a system that will guarantee us what I keep calling a soup to nuts array of employment services.  And that is available equally across the state.  
	So before we tell you about what we did or what we're in the process of doing related to the CRP process we're going to shift gears for a minute and talk a little bit more about business relations.  So a few years ago we were able to have kind of a strong and vibrant business relations team.  And then through a series of changes we found that we were at the point of needing to really rebuild our business services.  
	And it came basically at the same time that we started working with JD-VRTAC.  
	And we started to look at how we might be able to build some in-house capacity in a different way than we had in the past.  So what we did is we looked at a position, a Vocational Rehabilitation Counselor position in the northern part of the state.  And we were able to change the duties of that position so that half time they would become a business relations person who would be able to go out, a specialist who would be able to go out into a community to do business engagement to work differently with employers.  And not necessarily tied to any specific client although they can do that.  But really focusing on making those connections with employers.  
	So we were able to launch that position  And then we also looked at positions elsewhere in the state where we have two rehabilitation consultants who are able to do some of the business account manager business relations work going out meeting with employers, being a connection between ourselves in the agency and the employment community.  So we really tried to look at different creative ways that we could repurpose positions or build on the strengths that we already had to make a more comprehensive business relations team.  
	We feel very strongly that we have a dual customer in vocational rehabilitation.  And that's really been our approach.  And so we've been trying to recreate a team so that we can carry that out.  
	So in order to do that, we also looked at our other partners.  Here in Maine we didn't share this in the beginning but we're in the Department of Labor so that's really been a wonderful boost for partnering with our other WIOA and community partners.  We're located right here with employment services.  And out in the community we're co-located in career centers around the state which made it much easier to talk about how we could partner together.  
	So right now there are statewide and regional committees that have formed around employer engagement.  And our staff are part of those committees.  And that's really helped to both keep the focus on the individuals that we're serving but also benefit from leveraging other resources in the community.  We're also working closely with our partners in adult education, the university and community colleges.  And economic development agencies across the state.  A couple of career centers have recently moved so they are co-located on community college campuses and we're very excited about some new opportunities that that might open up for us, as well.  One of the ways that we're working together is by using America's job link as a common database for attacking effectiveness in serving employers, the WIOA statewide measure and that's been great because we were collecting a lot of information in VR on employers that we were meeting in the community but this is allowing them to put it into a common database where we can look across our system and that was really important because we didn't want to get into a situation where we might go out, somebody from our staff might go out and meet with an employer one day and then have someone from employment services or another DOL bureau be out there the next day and not be in conversation together.  We want to be presenting a solid front to the employer community.  So this is one way we can help to share that information.  
	Another piece that we're really excited about here in Maine for the last two years we have been piloting the progressive employment model that was developed in Vermont.  And many of you are aware of this model.  We worked closely with Institute for Community Inclusion.  
	And we've been piloting it in two of our largest offices, Portland and Lewiston focusing with the emphasis under WIOA to do more with that pre-employment transition services and youth population.  And progressive employment has a philosophy that everyone is ready for something.  And it also has a strong dual customer approach where we're really meeting the needs of employers  At the same time that we're increasing opportunities in this case for young people to get out into the community.  And this was something that was really important.  Sometimes you have heard and perhaps others of you in vocational rehabilitation have heard of this, too, that we're not engaging with our clients soon enough and we found this particularly true for young people.  They wanted to not just sit around and talk.  They wanted to get out there and be connected in the community.  So working with progressive employment allowed us to more rapidly engage young people and to make those sexes partnering with Community Rehabilitation Provider agencies who came to the table to work with us on this initiative.  And also having a key role of the business account manager who could go out and do some of that business engagement in a new way for us.  
	So we have found this extremely successful as an approach for business engagement and it's really starting to I would say to impact how we're looking at services across our agency.  We have a new grant that has focused on implementing progressive employment in two other regions.  And we're seeing that the way that business engagement is done in the progressive employment model that kind of low and no risk approach has been particularly successful and we're sharing those findings with our partners in employment services, as well.  
	So now I want to shift gears for a minute, too, and talk about all of the assistance we got through JD-VRTAC which has been wolf and we thank Paula and Laurie and Linda for all of their assistance and also our special thanks to DeBrittany, too, who has been wonderful in this process with us.  And they really have sat with us and helped us think through some very challenging situations that we found ourselves in and brought to us some great resource, particularly in data analysis, in helping us to explore other CRP payment systems used by other state VR programs  Helped us around communication.  So as you can imagine, this is a big piece.  How we're communicating both with other workforce partners and also with our clients around different approaches.  
	They helped us provide feedback on new forms for CRP.  And shared great ideas regarding coordination of business outreach from other projects that were going on in the JD-VRTAC.  
	And they certainly put on some great learning forums.  And I think between Chris and myself and other staff, we were able to attend many of them.  And really take away some great best practices.  
	So we certainly thank them very much for all the work that they have done with us to date.  It's been extremely helpful.  
	>> CHRISTINE ROBINSON:  So this is Chris and I would just like to second the thank you from Libby from JD-VRTAC.  It was quite helpful to us.  And as we had mentioned earlier, their first site visit was back in June of 2016.  There was a lot going on.  Looking at the data from the new hybrid system, looking at the numbers of CRPs gradually going down and really trying to figure out what was the next best step.  
	So we had a series of meetings and discussions with stakeholders.  We pulled together a workgroup of stakeholders that included all of the entities that we mentioned earlier.  And we piled through the data.  We had a lot of help from JD-VRTAC.  And in the end decided that a Request for Proposal was the right way to go.  
	So roughly two years after that first site visit with JD-VRTAC and a lot of discussion in June of 2018 we put out an email to all of the CRPs we have under contract as well as all of our staff and various other stakeholders to let them know that it was our intention to put the Community Rehab Provider services out to bid.  
	And the reason why we're doing this is so that we can provide a consistent and comprehensive employment service system to job seekers with disabilities across the state.  Because as I had mentioned really at this point we have a patchwork of services that really is not best practice.  And not best for our clients.  
	So we've been busily crafting that RFP.  And just wanted to highlight some of the essential elements that shouldn't really be a surprise to anybody on this webinar.  
	But some of the essential elements would be obviously informed choice for our clients.  The idea that Libby mentioned earlier that comes from progressive employment.  But really is a universal approach to our services.  And that is that everyone is ready for something.  
	We need to make sure that any CRP that is under contract with us is willing and able to serve across disability population.  And that would include providing services to all individuals that are referred regardless of the nature of their disability or the severity of their disability.  
	And that certainly cultural competency and respect for diversity is an important foundation.  And again, that continuity of services soup to nuts from career exploration to long-term support.  Regardless of where you are geographically in the state of Maine  
	So as part of that process, we did a lot of research.  And JD-VRTAC helped us with that in directing us to other states who had done similar things.  
	We looked at Hawaii's RFP.  We looked at a Connecticut RFP and we also looked at some RFPs from other departments from within Maine State Government.  
	So the question that people have been asking quite frequently lately is what is the current status of the RFP.  Because as you might recall from a previous slide and from the timeline, our intent was to roll out the RFP in quote late summer.  And is it Thursday that's the first --
	>> LIBBY STONE-STERLING:  You have a couple days left, Chris.
	>> CHRISTINE ROBINSON:  First day of autumn.  So we're getting pretty darn close.  
	So what we intend to do very soon is to provide a provisional graph for that Request for Proposal to our Division of Purchases so that they can provide some guidance both in terms of making sure that we're within the letter of the law and also provide some advice in terms of how to word things or structure things so that we -- the end result is what we're looking for  
	We've also been doing some ongoing consultation with Alliance, which is the company that owns and supports AWARE, which is the case management system that Maine and many other states use.  
	So we're getting some ongoing advice from them on the best way to use AWARE to track expenditures, reports and case documentation.  
	And again, we're also -- we've got some preliminary guidelines for how we would score the proposals that we receive.  But we are finalizing that system and looking for some advice from our division of purchases.  
	And anything else you would like to add, Libby, before we open it up for questions.
	>> LIBBY STONE-STERLING:  Nope, thanks, Chris.  I think we covered the material we were hoping to cover.
	>> CHRISTINE ROBINSON:  And we wanted to make sure that you all had our contact information.  In case some questions come up after the webinar.  
	Other than that, I will hand it back to Linda.
	>> LINDA MOCK: Yes, thank you, Chris and Libby.  We have a number of questions that have been typed into the chat area so I want to encourage anyone else who is a participant who has a question, please put it in there.  Because this is our opportunity to get your question answered.  
	The first question is from Lisa.  And I think it's back regarding the milestone system that you had in place.  And the question is, is the 15% bonus that you referred to calculated at 15% of the 4,000 or what is it calculated from?  
	>> CHRISTINE ROBINSON:  This is Chris.  And that's a very good question.  And you know, as I was saying that, I realized that I probably should have been clearer on that.  It is in fact it would be 15% on top of each one of those milestones  
	>> LINDA MOCK: Okay.  Great.  Thank you.  
	And our next question is from Morgan.  She wants to know how many hours do you typically authorize for job development services per month.
	>> LIBBY STONE-STERLING:  Oh that's a big question.  
(Chuckles).
	>> LINDA MOCK: It's a hard one to pull off the top of your head, I'm sure.
	>> LIBBY STONE-STERLING:  Well this is Libby and I'll just say, Morgan, as you know, too, under the progressive employment model and where we have been using that, that has a much more open approach to job development in the sense that we're really -- we're really letting that be dictated by what the clients' needs are right from the get-go when they are in conversation with the Community Rehab Provider.  So that has a different way that -- in that model, a different way that we are approaching it.  I would say otherwise, we really are basic it on the clients' needs.  And letting that be what dictates how much job development would get.  I think we can say over time what does an average look like.  But we really try to make sure that it's based on the individual's needs.
	>> LINDA MOCK: Okay.  Thank you, Libby.  We had someone who wanted to know if they could get a copy of the PowerPoint slides  And DeBrittany actually answered that in the chat area with a specific URL.  But essentially if you if to -- if you go to exploreVR.org you can find all of our PowerPoints there.  So that one has been answered.  
	We also have a question on who exactly comprises your group of CRPs?  
	Are we talking about the group that --
	>> CHRISTINE ROBINSON:  Are we talking about the group who consulted on changing the system or who do I mean by the CRPs, the 41 CRPs?  
	>> LINDA MOCK: Yeah I think they were referring to my guess is the total group of CRPs that you have providing services, how is that determined when you were counting those?
	>> So, first of all, any qualified Community Rehab Provider qualified and interested can contract with the state of Maine to provide employment services.  So those 41 entities are under contract with the state of Maine.  And they vary from a one-person company who works out of their home to a lot of medium-sized agencies to fairly large agencies that many of us know such as Goodwill or Work Opportunities Unlimited that sort of thing.  So I'm not sure if that answers the question or not.
	>> LINDA MOCK: Thank you.  We also have a question asking if you can talk about what assumptions led to the decision to move to the milestone system?  
	>> LIBBY STONE-STERLING:  Hi this is Libby, hi, Neil.  What assumptions?  Well, I think we were trying to at that time and that was just kind of at the time that I was coming on into vocational rehabilitation.  But I think part of the challenge then was we saw a lot of clients who were coming into job development and really were getting stuck there.  We weren't seeing that they were moving at the pace that they wanted or at the pace that we expected.  
	So we began to really have a lot of conversation and our former director Betsy Hopkins and others at the time really were looking at what might a model be that might help to move people along.  What incentives might be able to be put in place.  
	And I think that was part of it.  To really try to meet client needs and think about how we could move them into employment in a way that met their needs better.  
	>> LINDA MOCK: Okay.  Thanks, Libby.  And then we have Laurie is asking within the progressive employment model, how did you manage the question about the employer of record and the provision of liability and workers compensation insurance?  
	(Audio lost).
	>> LIBBY STONE-STERLING:  Individuals going out and doing work in the community for an employer so we needed to make sure that we didn't artificially create an employment relationship with the state.  And so in order to do that, we have contracts with staffing agencies and the individual then becomes an employee of the staffing agency during the time of the work experience.  And the staffing agency covers the liability insurance and workers comp
	>> LINDA MOCK: Okay.  Thank you.  And then we have a question from Karen who is asking, can you say more about what you mean by hybrid?  In other words am I correct in looking at the fee structure that you have gone back to a fee-for-service except for then milestone payments for retention of employment?  And then a follow up to that question is was your prior fee-for-service as specific and delineated as it is shown in the hybrid program slides?  
	>> CHRISTINE ROBINSON:  So this is Chris.  And yes.  Your description of the hybrid program is correct.  It is in fact fee-for-service.  But we did want to maintain some of the bonuses for milestones.  So you're exactly right on that.  
	And I would say on the delineation for services for fee-for-service, we did make a point of getting much more specific which services generally speaking fit into the $35 an hour sort of general job development bucket so to speak versus which services fit into the $30 an hour more job coaching type bucket.  And just made sure we had very explicit definitions in each one of those services.  Because we were finding that CRPs and VRCs were sometimes at odds and we would get a monthly report and the description of the service that was provided was not the service that the VR counselor was looking for.  
	>> LINDA MOCK: I have actually a follow-up question in that area where when you went into the hybrid system you were offering bonuses around placement and employment of individuals on SSI and SSDI as well as I believe some incentives for what I would call kind of rapid placement.  
	Were you able to identify any results that were produced or any gains in those areas as a result of the bonuses being put in place?  
	>> LIBBY STONE-STERLING:  Do you mean in terms of the timeliness of placement.
	>> LINDA MOCK: Yeah or the SSI/SSDI individuals getting to placement.  Did you see any increases once you had the hybrid system in place from what those numbers had been prior to having those.
	>> LIBBY STONE-STERLING:  The SSI/SSDI bonus was present in the milestones previously.  So --
	>> LINDA MOCK: Okay.  So we -- we just maintained that.  And for Maine in general for the Bureau of Rehab Services we're able to under the cost reimbursement program take in about a million dollars a year.  So we rolled that right back into case services so that's something we rely on heavily.  
	I would say as far as placement goes, we have some good solid data in terms of time to eligibility and time to plan and I would say in general my sense and I'm looking to Libby I would say that placement is also happening much more quickly.
	>> LIBBY STONE-STERLING:  I think it is.  We probably don't have the specifics to share with you right now but we could certainly share more information if somebody wanted to email us directly afterwards we could follow up.
	>> LINDA MOCK: Okay.  Thank you.  And then we have a question from Carol.  Her question is, has the decrease in the number of CRPs and the compensation rate created a capacity issue for Maine?  And what method did you use to determine the rate for each service?  Did you do a cost survey of CRPs?  What was the basis?  
	>> Well it's definitely created a resource issue, no question.  As far as the cost goes, I wasn't that directly involved with that so I can't speak in a lot of detail.  But we were looking at cost of successful closures on average.  We weren't really looking to save money.  We were hoping to kind of stabilize the expenditures, if that answers the question at all.  
	Anything you want to add to that Libby?
	>> LIBBY STONE-STERLING:  Well, I think part of you described the CRP Steering Committee  So part of this whole process right up to this point really has been to get feedback from CRPs about where their expenses are, what are the real costs of doing business, how does it align with what's being paid by other state agencies.  
	I think we've worked closely across our system up to this point.  But we're recognizing that there are some real challenges there.  So I think you know our hope is that in this new RFP that we'll see some of those issues addressed around cost.  
	>> LINDA MOCK: Okay.  Thank you.  I do not see -- oh, we just got a new question popped in so I have another question from Karen.  Who is part of your CRP Steering Committee?  And how did you decide who should be a part of that committee and what purposes is it used for at this time?  
	>> CHRISTINE ROBINSON:  So it was essentially the folks who were on that stakeholder slide.  I can go back to that if you would like.  But we invited CRPs.  We knew we couldn't have 41 at the table.  So our thinking was to have representatives from the largest CRPs, the medium sized.  And the one-person -- one to two-person shops.  So that we had a good representation of the different interests of those CRPs.  We had some of our own staff, VR counselors from across the state.  We had our Client Assistance Program and Disability Rights Maine.  
	We had representatives from those agencies within the Department of Health and Human Services that we have a close relationship with.  So it's that same group that we had mentioned previously.  
	And at the moment really that Steering Committee is not meeting currently.  And I would imagine that once the RFP is out and we've got a new system in place, we want to have ongoing feedback in terms of how this is working for those stakeholders.  So we would invite them back for more input.  
	>> LIBBY STONE-STERLING:  And Chris, just to add to that, I think really the purpose was a time limited Steering Committee  It was really we didn't -- we were respectful of peoples' time and we didn't want people to have to commit to an ongoing group that just met forever and ever.  
	So it was really around some targeted needs, address those and then as Chris says, come back together as different issues might come up in the future.  
	>> LINDA MOCK: Okay.  And I think we have one final question here from one of our participants Liang.  Does your VRC or rehab consultant conduct their own job development and placement?  
	>> LIBBY STONE-STERLING:  We missed the very first part of that question, Linda, could you read it again?  
	>> LINDA MOCK: Sure.  Does your VRC or rehab consultant conduct their own job development and placement?  
	>> LIBBY STONE-STERLING:  Typically.  This is Libby.  Typically we would say that we would work through Community Rehab Provider.  But not exclusively.  So we certainly do have some of our staff who are doing job development and placement and on occasion job coaching when the need arises.  And that's certainly we're looking to both build some internal capacity around that piece as well as relying as appropriate on Community Rehab Providers.  
	>> LINDA MOCK: Okay.  I don't think we have any more questions that are showing up.  So I want to take the opportunity to thank you, Libby and Chris both for your presentation today.  As well as for -- thank you for allowing us to work with you on the JD-VRTAC.  It's been great working with you.  And getting to see the great effort that you're putting into this issue.  And improving the services that you have for people with disabilities that you're serving in your state.  So thank you very much.  I think in closing I just want to say that probably many of you know that the JD-VRTAC has been a grant funded project through the Rehab Services Administration and it is coming to an end this month actually, September 30th.  But the good news on that is that the services on the job-driven side for technical assistance are being moved to the WINTAC another Technical Assistance Center and a number of us will continue on in this role.  So if any of the participants are looking for technical assistance around the job-driven areas of business engagement, labor market information, customized training, that will continue to be available through the WINTAC in the future.  So thank you all very much for participating today.  And with that I'll turn it back over to DeBrittany for her closing remarks.
	>> DeBRITTANY MITCHELL:  Thank you to Libby, Chris and Linda for facilitating a great webinar.  Just a couple of things before we close.  First, this is hot off the press.  But we will have an additional job-driven webinar in this series that will be presented by Tennessee Rehabilitation Services.  And that will take place on September 27th at 1:00 o'clock Eastern Time.  So please visit Explore VR to register for that later this afternoon.  
	And also just a reminder, if you are a CRC -- requesting CRC credit, you will receive an email with a survey.  And you must complete the survey in order to receive that credit.  As always, thank you to all of the attendees for joining and for supporting the Job-Driven Vocational Rehabilitation Technical Assistance Center for the last few years.  We appreciate your support.  And please, please feel free to visit Explore VR to visit the explore VR toolkits and additional materials that are available to all VR agencies.  
	Thank you and have a great day.  

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This is being provided in a rough-draft format.  Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) is provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings.  
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