Narrative: d. 2. F.

The Division of Vocational Rehabilitation (DVR), Office of Workforce Development, the Developmental Disabilities Council (DDC), Mental Health Service Organizations, Office of Community Living (OCL), Office of Behavioral Health (OBH), the Behavioral Health Planning Council, and employers have an extensive history of collaborative and cooperative efforts to provide supported employment opportunities in Colorado for individuals with the most significant disabilities. The DVR Coordinator of Supported Employment serves on the Developmental Disabilities Council and the Behavioral Health Planning Council. The Workforce Innovation Opportunity Act of 2014 (WIOA) further emphasizes the need for state agencies and other entities to develop innovative cooperative agreements as a strategy to leverage State/Federal dollars and encourage inter-agency cooperation. The Colorado Division of Vocational Rehabilitation believes that expansion of supported employment to all individuals needing supports to maintain competitive, integrated employment cannot be accomplished without such collaborative efforts. DVR is in the process of developing new inter-agency agreements with our partner agencies.

Office of Behavioral Health, Department of Human Services

The Office of Behavioral Health (OBH) and the Division of Vocational Rehabilitation (DVR) have maintained a formal interagency agreement to provide vocational services to individuals with the most significant mental health disabilities. This agreement represents a collaborative effort to increase access to quality vocational services and to ensure the availability of supported employment opportunities for individuals with the most significant disabilities due to mental illness.

The agreement stipulates collaborative planning and coordination of services by the local mental health centers, private agencies, and rehabilitation offices to eliminate duplication of services and maximize available resources. It also contains provisions for purchase of supported employment services. Such services are only purchased from vendors approved by both OBH and DVR, such as mental health centers and community-based programs. However, the rehabilitation counselor and client are responsible for determining the appropriate services and developing the supported employment Individualized Plan for Employment. Service providers must be registered with DVR to provide supported employment services under the DVR/OBH cooperative agreement. DVR and OBH have developed a new interagency agreement to comply with the provisions of WIOA and reflect the changes needed due to DVR’s move to the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment (CDLE) as of July 1, 2016.

Improvements have been realized in interagency planning, training, information sharing, and resolving mutual programmatic and procedural concerns. There has been ongoing cooperation at the State level between DVR and OBH. OBH has included funding for ongoing supports as part of its contracts with mental health centers. OBH has hired a full time Individual Placement and Support (IPS) trainer to assist Mental Health Centers that have adopted this service provision model and DVR is partnering with OBH to implement IPS in all community mental health centers. This involves a Capacity Based Protocol Funding approach (braided funding with DVR, OBH & Medicaid) and training on the IPS model to Employment Teams, DVR Counselors, and other relevant partners. Community Mental Health Centers that implement IPS are involved in the Colorado IPS Learning Community and agree to follow the IPS Fidelity Scale. Annual Fidelity Reviews are conducted by the Colorado IPS Leadership Team, which includes staff from OBH, DVR, and other organizations.

In Colorado, collaboration among relevant state agencies, private nonprofit organizations and other community resources for the provision of extended ongoing support services takes many forms, ranging from informally established local cooperative working relationships between direct providers and clients of supported employment services to formally negotiated statewide agreements among state agencies. Informal working agreements are developed to coordinate activities such as transition from intensive supported employment services to extended services, the types of extended services to be provided, identifying qualified individuals to provide extended support, and referral to the Division of Vocational Rehabilitation (DVR) for post-employment services.

The primary entities involved in these types of collaborative efforts are local rehabilitation offices, local school districts, Workforce Centers, independent living centers, local community rehabilitation programs, mental health centers, developmental disabilities service providers, community centered boards and other available service providers, including advocates, family members and private vendors. Although supported employment depends on these informal collaborative efforts, more efforts are needed to enhance the availability of extended support services following completion of intensive supported employment services authorized under WIOA.

DVR has 12 Mental Health Supported Employment programs around the state to provide services to participants eligible for supported employment. The contracts involve billing for services for individual eligible participants according to their service needs. Regular monitoring of these contracts occurs through a variety of mechanisms, including monthly progress reports and billing, quarterly Mental Health Consortium meetings, and a mid-year performance survey. For the eight Mental Health Supported Employment programs engaged in IPS, the IPS Fidelity Review also serves as an annual monitoring of the program.

For participants living in areas where there is not an available program, DVR will utilize vendors for the time limited services and the mental health centers have agreed to provide extended services.