By James R. Sheldon

James Sheldon is the Supervising Attorney of the Disability Law Unit at Neighborhood Legal Services, Inc. in Buffalo, New York.

It is well-known that very few Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) or Supplemental Security Income (SSI) recipients ever go to work and eliminate their need for benefits. Many fear they will lose their monthly benefit check and be without income if their work attempt fails. A greater fear for many is the loss of health benefits in the form of Medicare or Medicaid. Since most recipients do not understand how work affects benefits, they often play it safe and either avoid work or work on a very limited basis.

The Social Security Administration (SSA) wants to encourage more SSDI and SSI recipients to work and has awarded "demonstration grants" to 12 states, including New York, to see what steps can be taken to get more recipients working. New York’s five-year demonstration project is known as NY Works and will have demonstration sites in Buffalo (i.e., Erie County) and New York City. It will provide project participants – i.e., a limited number of SSDI or SSI recipients – special services and, possibly, a waiver of existing SSDI or SSI rules to see if those special circumstances will make it more likely that the recipient [recipients? DN] will go to work and either eliminate or reduce their need for benefits..

The State Department of Labor heads up a Steering Committee that will guide planning and implementation of the project. This committee includes representatives of every state agency involved in employment of persons with disabilities, including the Office of Vocational and Educational Services to Individuals with Disabilities (VESID), the Commission for the Blind and Visually Handicapped (CBVH), the Office of Mental Health (OMH) and the Office of Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities (OMRDD). It also includes representatives from private agencies, private sector employers and consumers.

Year 1 of the project, October 1998 through September 1999, is dedicated to planning and involves the work of three "design teams." A Work Incentive Design Team seeks to identify ways to better promote and use the current SSDI/SSI work incentives and to identify waivers of existing rules the project should seek from the SSA.. An Education and Training Design Team is looking at methods of disseminating information about the project, and about work incentives and related matters in order to better promote employment of persons with disabilities. An Employment and Employer Supports Design Team is looking at ways to best serve individuals and the employers who hire them to increase the likelihood of successful, long-term employment among persons with disabilities.

For Year 2 of the project, beginning on October 1, 1999, NY Works will target SSDI or SSI recipients with a mental health diagnosis as project participants in Buffalo and New York City. Beginning in Year 3 (i.e., 2000-2001), the project will serve persons with disabilities other than mental health diagnoses.

If you want more information about NY Works, you can call Project Director, Carolyn Peterson-Vaccaro at the State DOL, 518-485-6176. Assistant Project Directors, Valerie Melburg and Gary Nicklaus, can also be reached at that number. The project also has local contact people in Buffalo (Jim Sheldon of Neighborhood Legal Services, 716-847-0650) and New York City (John Rio of Corporation for Supportive Housing, 212-986-2966). Information will also be available through a NY Works newsletter to be published starting in the summer of 1999. If you would like to be put on the newsletter mailing list, please call one of the persons listed above.