Annual Report
For FY 2016
Group Home
Annual Group Home Report 2016
The Group Home Department continues to struggle to get referrals to fill our
vacancies. We currently have four children’s vacancies. Over the past 3 years, we
have averaged 3 vacancies. This has contributed towards a financial loss for the
group home department. We also took on some added cost from the closure of our
North central program and from past cut backs.
BDDS is our placing authority; however they are not actively placing children.
They will sign a child up for the family support waiver, but they do not mention
group homes. The referrals we are getting continue to come from DCS, but are far
and few between. DCS has to fill out and go through the BDDS referral process for
agency like ours to be able to receive a packet. That is if the child meets level of
care and that all other placements/services have been considered &/or exhausted.
There is a BDDS liaison between BDDS, DCS and DOE. The Liaison and the
others meet weekly to review the cases. I had two potential kids in our area; our
group homes were over looked and they were placed elsewhere. I was told that
they were relooking at the process, but not told how.
January was the last referral/placement through DCS. Our homes have seen a lot
of damage from some of these kids. Are homes just are not set up to handle these
types of destructive behaviors. Also, some of the behaviors are hard to manage; we
worry if we can always keep some of them safe. They just are not always an
appropriate placement, but due to the lack of referrals or a lack of information; we
take our chances.
We have been holding out in hopes the children’s referral process will change
knowing that there is a need. In-Pact, at some point will have to make a decision
on how long to hold out verses the amount of loss that we are accruing. Other
options would be to age out another child’s home and relicense it to an adult home.
We could even request to make it a 6-bed to make it more financially sound. We
also could enter into a working agreement with DCS and provide residential
services through that source.
BDDS continues to attend most of the individual’s annuals and ask them
(individual/family) if they are happy with their placement or if they would like
information about the waiver. There have not been any surprises on the folks
whom have expressed interest and have moved into our Supported Services.
We are able to find adults that want group home placement and guide them
through the BDDS process for placement. I currently have 2 that are waiting for an
opening. We also move folks from our children’s home that has or is close to aging
out into the adult opening. Because of this, I have not had to request for any adult
men referral packets for some time.
We continue to get our annual survey by the Indiana State Department of Health
(ISDH) and Life Safety inspections. There were Life Safety code changes, so we
had to make some additional accommodations to our egress from the basement and
2nd floor bedrooms. I had requested an extension to State allowing us additional
time to complete these projects then our usual 2-4 weeks. This was granted and
the work has been completed.
We continue to not only see high turnover in staff, but there is a real shortage of
staff. Most of the staff that we do get is substandard at best. Our managers
sometimes don’t get a day off, on top of work a lot of hours without getting paid
for it. We also have been unable to give the managers and the staff their PTO; in
some cases, we are still so low, that Coordinators have had to work. We had started
a group meetings to discuss the staff/hiring crisis.
Group homes took over doing their own individual’s Medicaid and Social Security
benefits. So, we hired a 30 hour Coordinator do this and the supervision over one
group home. This has been extremely helpful due to the addition
requirements/work that ISDH expects us to do. One Coordinator having five
homes was taking its toll.
Supported Services
Fiscal Year 2016 has been a year of stability and change all at the same time. In October of 2015
we were notified that our moratorium has been lifted. This came as wonderful news to those of
us who worked so hard to reverse this decision and who finally understood that this was in many
ways a witch hunt designed to force us to change the way we did business. When all is said and
done we came out of this a stronger and more quality driven organization. And while we had
started this process with one director at BQIS and finished with another one, In-Pact’s leadership
remains consistent, dedicated and in place as always. In November of 2015 In-Pact met with the
then Director of BQIS to discuss many of our issues that came up during this moratorium process
and to clear the air on many issues. The sad fact is, that none of that matters now as there is yet
again a new Director at BQIS and with a new Governor waiting to take office in Indianapolis,
who knows what 2017 will bring to this role.
We slowly began to see referrals start to come back to Supported Services in April and May of
2016. Yes, even though we were taken off the moratorium in late 2015. Referrals didn’t start
trickling in until the spring of 2016. Since then we have seen a steady stream of new referrals,
especially for in-home services, but as of late summer and fall of 2016 we have begun to see an
increase in Supported Living referrals as well. This will help us to grow in the coming year and
it is our hope that by spring of 2017 all of our Supported Living Vacancies will be filled.
In 2016 we started the process of providing Wellness Coordination which is a waiver service that
allows for Supported Services Individuals to have extra medical attention and follow along to
help ensure that those with extreme medical issues get the medical care that they need. Currently
we have 36 active wellness cases that we do a weekly consultation meeting on, and then they
also get face to face consultations with a member of the nursing staff. Because of this we have
been able to welcome Tammy Panagiotidis to our team and she has settled into the hectic ever
changing world that is Supported Living. She has done an excellent job so far. This program
has been instrumental so far is increasing the health and well-being of the individual’s that we
serve. That is the overall goal of Wellness Coordination.
In 2016 Supported Services welcomed two new faces to the management team. In the spring of
2016 we welcomed in Marco Slifer who came to us from the Valparaiso sites as a consistent and
strong team player. Marco has always been a do whatever it takes type of person and that
certainly carries through as a new manager. Marco goes the extra mile that is for sure, for his
staff and the individuals we serve. And last month we added to our management ranks Tiaesha
Jarrett-Starks. Tiaesha came to us from Quad 2 and has spent the past 6 or 7 months being
mentored and shown the ropes by Tim Brown her manager. Tiaesha interviewed for the job that
Marco received in the spring, but at the time I felt she needed to have a better understanding of
what the job entailed. When I notified her that she didn’t get the job, I challenged Tiaesha to get
with her Manager Tim and ask for responsibility, to seek to learn what his job is, and to help him
in those ways. I then asked Tim if he would help her to gain the experience she needed. When
an opening came around this fall, she was more than ready for the task. I am proud to say that
for the first time in 18 years are all from within the agency and all come from the ranks of direct
support professionals. This has long been a goal in Supported Services to identify individual
staff who work direct care, and work to put them on the path to moving upwardly in the agency.
After many years, this goal has come to fruition in a good way. I am proud to have so many
excellent direct care staff that there is a pool of people who can be identified and tagged to move
up when needed. This maintains consistency and continuity in the services we provide.
Community Resources
For Community Resources, as is always the case, we were met with plenty of changes. We had a
management change at the Clubhouse. Dina Castillo has taken over as the new Clubhouse
Manager. Dina had worked as a Community Learning Program Instructor for several years so is
very familiar with Clubhouse operations. She moved seamlessly into her new role and things are
working well. In addition to this change, after 18 years, Heather Chopps stepped down from her
position as Director. Richard Holland was hired in May 2016 to fill this role. Richard comes to
IN-PACT with many years of experience in the field in several states. He has held various
positions over his career such as QDDP, Health Care Coordinator, Behavior Clinician and
Special Education instructor. In the short time Richard has been here, he has proved to be a true
asset to Community Resources and IN-PACT.
Participants of the Clubhouse continued to enjoy a wide array of activities this year including
Yoga class, Cooking class and Arts and Craft class. Movie days continue to be a big hit. The
individuals also still enjoy regular outings in small groups. They visit Stoney Run Park, Lake
County Fairgounds, Albanese Candy Factory, Cedar Lake Pier, lunches out, picnics, bowling,
shooting pool, dollar movie days and shopping. Of course, the Individuals had their large group
outings to the Lake County Fair and Harvest Time Pumpkin Patch and made many great
memories. Over the year, the Clubhouse has had a “Makeover”. With the assistance of several
very crafty staff, individuals created beautiful arts and crafts to decorate the Clubhouse. Dina has
given them “free reign” to decorate and they have done an amazing job. Every room and hall
way is now bright, colorful and welcoming.
The Supported Employment Program (SEFA) has only a few consumers left in the program. This
is a program that we have decided to cut back on due to the increasing cost and deceasing
reimbursement structure. The few consumers left are those that have been maintaining these jobs
for over 10 years.
Last year was spent focusing on staff appreciation and recognition. We had 3 staff receive gift
cards in the monthly “Congratulations” drawing for going above and beyond! We also increased
staff training opportunities. We had 2 staff attend the Direct Support Professional conference in
Indianapolis and they brought back a plethora of information to share. In addition, we are now
scheduling all staff to attend monthly in-services in addition to their required trainings.
This next year Community Resources will be focusing, as always, primarily on cutting costs by
maintaining proper consumer to staff ratios and increasing utilization of consumer budgeted
hour. We will continue focusing attention on more staff recognition and appreciation as well as
providing them additional support through improvements to training strategies. We will also be
working closely with the new Quality Assurance and Improvement Coordinator, Group Home
Department and Supported Services department to ensure the services that we provide are up to
BQIS, State Board of Health and CARF standards as well as continuing to improve services to
our individuals.
Behavior Support Services
The Behavior Support Department is comprised of three full time Behavior Specialists and a part
time Behavior Specialist. We have hired a full time Assistant Behavior Specialist that will begin
employment August 12, 2016. Services are provided to 40 Group Home individuals, 30 In-Pact
Support Services individuals and 30 non-In-Pact (residential) waiver individuals, for a grand
total of 102 individuals. Group home consumers receiving behavior support has increased 20%,
as vacancies are filled. In-Pact supported services individuals receiving behavior support has
remained the same from the previous year, while outside individuals increased by 2%. We have
increased our total services by 8% from the previous year.
The greatest growth for Behavior Support is through the Family Supports Waiver and referrals
from collaborating agencies. We do not have a waiting list and have the capacity to accept new
families as referred and appropriate to our service model. The employment of four fulltime and
one part time staff maintains high quality behavior support for established individuals while
initiating new referrals. The addition of an Assistant position allows the Department to absorb
allotted billable hours while improving the clinical teamwork toward each individual.
A Functional Analysis Clinic continues to be available, but has not been used this past year.
Group Home individuals are assessed for potential need and will be provided with a Functional
Analysis if warranted. Functional Analyses are a precise measure of behavior function and serve
as best practice within the field of Applied Behavior Analysis.
The Behavior Support Department continues to accept interns at a Bachelor and Master level in
psychology and social work. Interns have been placed within the Supported Living and Group
Home Departments, learning and assisting with quality assurance, programmatic coordination
and direct care.
All Specialists continue membership with Indiana Association of Behavior Consultants (INABC). CEU requirements afford opportunity for conference attendance as well as workshops
covering topics related to disabilities and Behavior Analysis.