Statement of the Department of Justice on Application of the Integration Mandate of Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act and Olmstead v. L.C. to State and Local Governments’ Employment Service Systems for Individuals with Disabilities

a. Individualization of Services

The success of a person with a disability in competitive integrated employment often depends on the individual “matching” of the person’s skills, abilities, and interests with both a set of services and a job. Individualization of services is achieved through a process by which a person with a disability identifies his or her particular interests, preferences, strengths, skills, and support needs for the purpose of finding, obtaining, and maintaining employment. This process includes: 1) assessments that evaluate the individual’s skills, strengths, and support needs in an integrated setting; and 2) person-centered planning. 23 Individualization typically depends upon a career development plan developed by a qualified employment professional who is familiar with how to support people with disabilities in competitive integrated employment and how to connect a person with a disability with employment opportunities identified in the local job market. Employment professionals, like job developers and job coaches, typically match a person’s distinct interests and capabilities with an employer’s unmet needs to create a strong job match and a potential employment opportunity.

b. Intensity and Duration of Services

In employment, people with disabilities are generally most successful in achieving integration to the fullest extent possible when they receive the amount, intensity, and duration of services and supports that will allow them to work in an integrated employment setting for the maximum number of hours consistent with their preferences and skills. Supported employment services that are provided in a sufficient amount, intensity, and duration are more likely to meet the requirements of the integration mandate and will better prepare people with disabilities for integrated employment in the long run. The type, amount, and intensity of someone’s services may change over time, but such services should be provided for a sufficient duration to ensure that the person can continue to succeed after initial job stabilization to avoid placing the person at risk of unnecessary segregation. The need for such services and supports may fade over time as individuals become accustomed to their employment and become connected with natural supports, including supports provided by co-workers and peers. However, particularly at the beginning of a job, it is important that supported employment services be provided in a manner that meets a person’s needs.

Understanding the resource limitations inherent to public systems, employment service systems may wish to consider how to design models that invoke promising practices to provide such supports in the most integrated setting while rewarding outcomes and efforts made based on individual need. Additionally, state and local government entities may assess, rebalance, and redistribute their resources to emphasize the provision of employment services in the most integrated setting appropriate.

c. Access to Integration During Non-Work Hours

In addition to integrated supported employment services on the job, integration in non-work services also supports the achievement of competitive integrated employment. Many states administer day service programs in combination with employment services, and sometimes such programs are co-located in facilities with sheltered workshops. The ADA’s integration mandate applies to public entities’ day service programs. Individuals with disabilities should have access to integrated ways to spend the hours when they are not working, such as chosen activities in the community at times and frequencies and with persons of their choosing, and interacting to the fullest extent possible with non-disabled peers instead of being relegated to services in segregated settings. For instance, integrated day services allow persons with intellectual and developmental disabilities to participate in and gain membership in mainstream community-based recreational, social, educational, cultural, and athletic activities, including community volunteer activities and training activities. Such integrated non-work activities can allow individuals with disabilities to develop autonomy and self-determination, networks of contacts, models, and mentors that assist in improving employment opportunities and outcomes.