Contact Your U.S. Senators Today; Ask Them to Pass the Build Back Better Act

 

November 19, 2021 | by Jerome Palliser

Access Living friends and allies,

This morning, the U.S. House passed the Build Back Better (BBB) Act, a massive investment in our social safety net that could improve the lives of millions of people. The BBB package is now on to the Senate, and is meaningful on many levels to people with disabilities, our friends and loved ones. Read for more detail below, and take a minute to ask your U.S. Senators to pass the BBB as is through this link today. Access Living is grateful to all of you who have fought to get the BBB this far! It has been hard work.

The BBB contains the single largest one-time investment in home and community-based services, EVER. Per the White House, the BBB will “permanently improve Medicaid coverage for home care services for seniors and people with disabilities, making the most transformative investment in access to home care in 40 years, when these services were first authorized for Medicaid. The framework will improve the quality of caregiving jobs, which will, in turn, help to improve the quality of care provided to beneficiaries.”

In addition to expanding home and community-based services, the Build Back Better Act would, among other things:

  • Permanently extend Money Follows the Person
  • Permanently extend Medicaid spousal impoverishment protections
  • Close the “Medicaid coverage gap” that leaves people below the poverty line without subsidies for health care coverage in states that have not adopted the Medicaid expansion
  • Reduce healthcare premiums for millions of people which would make it more affordable
  • Make new investments in affordable housing
  • Make investments to support the phaseout of subminimum wage employment of people with disabilities and promote competitive integrated employment.
  • Expand Medicare benefits to pay for hearing aids

For those of you who like to get the details, check out this briefThe long-term services and supports section starts on page 7.

For even more information, you can also check out these fact sheets:

Again, we need more help to get this through the Senate! Contact your Senators through this link today and ask all your friends to send emails too. Let’s go advocates!