FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

March 4, 2025

Contact: [email protected]

AUSTIN, TX – In case you missed it, last week the Texas House Appropriations Subcommittee on Article II heard testimonies on the direct support professional (DSP) workforce crisis that has destabilized community-based services for Texans with intellectual or developmental disabilities (IDD). Parents, providers, advocates, and Texans with IDD all made their voices heard in calling for the Texas Legislature to stabilize the community IDD service system in Texas by making a strategic investment that includes raising wages for community-based DSPs to at least $17.50 an hour to reduce turnover and attrition rates that threaten continuity of care for Texas’ most vulnerable residents.

To watch highlights from the testimonies during last week’s hearing, click here or on the image below.

“I want other families like mine to have the choice to support a loved one at home or in a nearby community group home. But IDD community services are in crisis due to insufficient funding at the state level.”

• Jamie Travis, Chair, Gulf Coast Center

“Group homes are closing; no new ones are opening. The low reimbursement rates are causal since they cause the funding for direct care professionals, and it is a matter of quality of life for individuals with IDD.”

• Donna Lawrence, mother of individual with IDD

“I am here pleading with you to increase these direct care provider wages – what they do, what they risk for these vulnerable individuals is beyond most any profession I have seen. Most, if not all, of my son’s care providers were working overtime, driving older cars, had families to provide for on a very meager wage.”

• Shelley Scraver, mother of individual with IDD

“As a law enforcement officer, I worry about the safety of those with IDD, and knowing that the direct care workers are paid significantly less than individuals in this position ever should.”

• Bo Stallman, Brazoria County Sheriff

“IDD providers need targeted funding to regain stability within the IDD system of care. This is more than just the base wage, this is funding in the daily rate to restore staffing ratios, the flexibility to fill the hardest shifts, the funding to pay for skyrocketing groceries, gasoline, and vehicle maintenance. Providers want to be compliant but we’re setting them up to fail.”

• Sandy Batton, Executive Director, PACSTX and Time To Care coalition member

“One of our individuals that we serve in a group home we have in San Antonio, we were able to get him placed into a part-time position working as a janitor and making $12 an hour. We were very excited for him – it was a big accomplishment for him based on his past history. But when our group home staff found out that he was making $12 an hour, they were pretty demoralized because that was making more than most of them were making.”

• Tony Ritter, Advantage Care Services

“My son now wants to live. And that’s due to the dedication of the staff who have shown him care. It breaks my heart to hear that passionate and caring members are forced to leave because they can make more working at a fast-food restaurant.”

• Deborah Green, mother of individual with IDD

“Not funding us properly is weakening and deteriorating the home and community-based services system. I closed one group home last year and have plans to close another one by May.”

• Denise Gasmire, Founder and CEO, Champion Services

“My staff takes me to doctors’ appointments, shopping, and to special Olympics practices and competitions. I would like the staff to be paid enough.”

• Ronnie Gross, Client, Mary Lee Foundation

“We have long, long, long-term staff, and when they leave for financial consideration, our individuals ask us: ‘Did they leave because of us? Because of me? I’ll be good now, if they’ll just stay.’ That is heartbreaking. The real reason that they stayed so long was because of the individuals, but it just reached a point where they couldn’t make it anymore, for their family or for themselves.”

• Kathy Griffith, Caregiver Inc.

“Because of labor and regulatory difficulties, many community providers have had to close their doors. Without competitive wages, the program will be obsolete, and the support and services for people with IDD will go backwards.”

• Gayle Long, Advantage Care Services

“It’s unsustainable…When the legislature fails to do its duty, which this is a program that it created, y’all might get a nasty email, a nasty phone call, maybe someone will come in here and chew on you a little bit. When we can’t meet our obligations, we go to jail. So, we’re really at a crisis state. If the legislature does not want to fund these programs at a rate where we can hire and retain competitive and competent staff in the marketplace, we will start closing our group homes down.”

• Cody Clark, Avid Quality Care

“For the awesome people we have who somehow are still working for this not adequate wage, they’re gonna leave us and go somewhere else and they’re too important to risk that.”

• Lauren Black, Reach Unlimited

Read more about what the Texas Legislature must do to save community IDD services in Texas here.

To learn more about what happens behind the scenes when caring for Texans with IDD in their communities, click here.

Time To Care: Save Texas Caregivers Now is a coalition dedicated to securing competitive wages for Direct Support Professionals (DSPs) who provide essential care to Texans with intellectual or developmental disabilities (IDD). Through collaboration and grassroots efforts, the coalition strives to enact meaningful change at both the legislative and community levels. Learn more about how to get involved at https://timetocaretx.org/

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