Family Supports

What We Know

Families are the core units of society; they have extraordinary care-giving responsibilities for their members with disabilities; and they prefer to keep their families intact and avoid out-of-home care. Federal and state policy and practice respond to those realities by providing funds and services to families. The number of families who have members with disabilities living in the family home, and the families' needs, are increasing, yet the amount of support for the families is not increasing.

What We're Doing

We have sponsored two national summits on family support, headed a consortium that developed a consensus statement and another that developed a definition of family support (both provided many justifications for family support), established policy initiatives around the Developmental Disabilities Assistance Act (which Congress will reauthorize this year or next) and Medicaid (which is a source of family support funds), and created a national Community of Practice that soon will be web-based.

We developed a Consensus Statement on Family Support and a Definition of Family Support.