This bill ensures more accessible housing units and workplaces are available in the state by bringing such buildings under the purview of the Massachusetts Architectural Access Board (AAB) when newly built or when major renovations take place.

This bill establishes the legal framework for Supported Decision-Making in Massachusetts, an alternative to guardianship in which adults can choose a group of trusted supporters to assist them with making and communicating decisions.

This bill builds more accessible and affordable homes by improving the Alternative Housing Voucher Program (AHVP) and allowing project-basing of AHVP vouchers.

These bills address high and rising prescription drug costs and reduce co-pays for people with certain chronic conditions.

This bill will allow spouses to be authorized to serve as paid caregivers in the MassHealth program for the provision of certain home-based care and services just as other relatives are already permitted to serve as paid caregivers.

People with disabilities are frequently the victims of explicit and implicit bias in the healthcare system, often with harmful and even deadly consequences. Some disabled patients have been denied treatments, medications, and even removed from life support, while others report being pressured to sign Do Not Resuscitate orders–all based on the presumption that the lives of people with disabilities have less worth and are less worth saving than the lives of people without disabilities. During the worst days of the COVID-19 pandemic, our own state government took the same approach, adopting Crisis Standards of Care that would have sent thousands of people with disabilities to the back of the line for lifesaving ventilators and ICU beds.

By strengthening warranty protections for Massachusetts residents with disabilities, we can level the playing field for consumers, shorten repair wait times, save taxpayer money, and ensure that we are all treated with dignity and respect.

Wheelchairs and scooters are often prone to defects and sudden failure. It is commonplace for consumers to be left stranded or isolated in their homes for weeks, or even months, awaiting repairs, unable to get to work, school, medical appointments, the grocery store, and in some cases to move around their own home.

The Personal Care Attendant (PCA) program enables over 40,000 people with disabilities and elderly people to live in the community with dignity and independence. The proposed cut to the program in the governor’s budget will disrupt this for an estimated 6000 people and many PCAs will lose their jobs. We are advocating for an increase in the MassHealth budget by $114 million to reverse the cuts that the governor included in her budget.

MassAccess is an online registry of affordable, accessible units, overseen by the Housing Navigator and MyMassHousing. Increased funding will help more low income people with disabilities find accessible units with up-to-date resources where they’re already looking.

It can be especially difficult for people with disabilities to find homes that meet their access needs. The Accessible Affordable Housing Grants (AAHG) offers developers and landlords grants to create or rehabilitate physically accessible housing that prioritizes AHVP recipients. This program has funded projects across the state since its inception a few years ago. The Governor’s budget did not include this program.

Parents with disabilities, especially psychiatric or intellectual disabilities, lose custody or parenting time at alarming rates due to disability discrimination – while 6.7% of parents in the U.S. have a disability, families in which a parent has a disability are disproportionately involved in the child welfare system. Across the board, disabled parents are 22% more likely to have their parental rights terminated, and parents with psychiatric disabilities are 26 times more likely to have their children removed from their homes. Parents should not be denied the right to raise their children solely on the basis of their disability.

People with disabilities are more than twice as likely to be homeless than their nondisabled peers. The Alternative Housing Voucher Program (AHVP) provides mobile housing vouchers to low-income individuals with disabilities between the ages of 18 and 60. The FY24 budget (and Governor Healey’s H.2 for FY25) included several changes to the language of the line item.