TO:	Commissioners; TA & FS Directors; WMS Coordinators

FROM:	Russell Sykes, Deputy Commissioner, Division of Employment and Transitional Supports

SUBJECT:	New Shelter Type ‘42’ for New Congregate Care Level 3

EFFECTIVE DATE:	Immediately

CONTACT PERSON: 1-800-343-8859
                                       TA Questions --Temporary Assistance Bureau (518) 474-9344
Systems Questions – Jim Dormond (518) 474-9286
                                       FS Questions – Food Stamp Bureau (518) 473-1469
SSI Questions – SSI Bureau (518) 473-0332	

PURPOSE

•	To inform Districts that effective January 1, 2006, adult homes and enriched housing programs certified by the Department of Health will be reclassified from Congregate Care Level 2 to Congregate Care Level 3 facilities.
•	To inform districts of the systems implications relating to this reclassification of adult homes and enriched housing programs.

BACKGROUND

Effective January 1, 2006, adult homes and enriched housing programs certified by the Department of Health (DOH) will be reclassified from Congregate Care Level 2 to Congregate Care Level 3 facilities. The new Congregate Care Level 3 is named “Enhanced Residential Care”.  This change will result in residents of affected facilities receiving higher shelter payments and higher personal needs allowances (PNAs) starting on January 1, 2006.   Districts will receive the annual Informational Letter (INF) for the SSA COLA increase that has the updated SSI Benefit Levels Chart effective January 1, 2006.

SYSTEMS IMPLICATIONS

Shelter Type Code Change

The new Congregate Care Level 3 TA and FS ABEL Budget shelter type overlay will be run on October 27 and be available to Districts on Friday, October 28, 2005. Based on a file passed from DOH that identifies TA and FS recipients who currently reside in DOH Adult Homes or Enriched Housing Programs, we will be overlaying the existing shelter types ‘10’, ‘16’ or ‘17’ in active cases with a ‘42 – DOH Adult Homes and Enriched Housing Programs’.  These cases will continue to be budgeted with the current Congregate Care Level 2 TA and FS amounts until the JAN MRB/A, when they will be eligible for the new Congregate Care Level 3 budgeting. Cases that are successfully completed will be available through WMS on the WMS PA/FS budget calculation menu (SF1), under function 6 (Mass Rebudget Inquiry). There will be listings of Eligible and Exception cases similar to a standard MRB/A, via 

office, unit, worker designations with ‘S42’ as the three character reason. These TIP files will only be available until Friday, November 4, 2005.  The ‘Invalid Shelter Type’ Exception shows that the case pulled in did not have a correct shelter type ‘10’, ‘16’ or ‘17’ and should be reviewed by the worker.  Districts with no TA or FS recipients identified by DOH as residing in DOH Adult Homes or Enriched Housing Programs will not receive Eligible or Exception lists.

Recipients who entered a DOH Adult Home or Enriched Housing Program after September 1st may not have been included in the list of recipients provided by DOH for whom benefits will be adjusted by the JAN MRB/A.  Districts must manually change the shelter type codes for such individuals.  Additionally, if the manual change to shelter type code ‘42’ is not made effective January 2006, such residents are entitled to retroactive benefits back to January 2006.

Food Stamp Impact

A report will also be mailed to Districts containing a list of individuals that are incorrectly active in NTA/FS cases that reside in Adult Home facilities. The cases that appear on this list should be closed due to FS ineligibility when in such a facility. ‘Alert F’ which will be found on the eligible lists on WMS will identify TA/FS cases of individuals that reside in Adult Homes that are incorrectly receiving FS as part of their TA case. In this situation, the Alert should be resolved by having the FS portion of the TA/FS case closed.

NYS SSI Supplementation Indicator Code Change in the Congregate Care Directory

The reclassification of DOH adult homes and enriched housing programs will result in a change to the ‘Supp Ind.’ (NYS SSI Supplementation Indicator Code) on the NYS Congregate Care Directory for the impacted facilities. The Congregate Care Directory is located on CentraPort.

On the NYS Congregate Care Directory, the SSI Supplementation Indicator code will change from Supp Ind. ‘D’ to Supp Ind. ‘E – Level 3’ for the impacted facilities.  This change impacts Adult Homes that have ‘Type’ (facility type) code of ‘E’ or ‘F’ and Enriched Housing Programs that have facility type code of ‘S’.  The new display for the ‘Supp Ind.’ column will be displayed in mid-December in preparation for the January 1, 2006 effective date.  The new display will enable districts to easily identify the level of care for facilities.