The National Council on Disability Report to President: Cursory Look at AbilityOne
Back in February, the National Council on Disability (NCD) submitted a report to President Trump providing an assessment and recommendations related to the AbilityOne Program and the work of the AbilityOne Commission.
The report provides an overview of the history of the history of the AbilityOne programs as well as more recent federal statutes and policies related to disability employment
Excerpts from the report:
“As federal law and policy surrounding the employment of people with disabilities progresses away from segregation and subminimum wages and towards integration and competitive wages, the AbilityOne Program has become a relic inconsistent with current federal law and policy. Changes in federal disability rights since 1973 highlight the conflicts between the AbilityOne Program and the goals of other federal disability laws.”
“In 2016 an Advisory Committee on Increasing Competitive Integrated Employment for Individuals with Disabilities (Advisory Committee), …noted vulnerabilities in the AbilityOne Program, including potential conflicts of interest since the determination of who is eligible to participate as an AbilityOne employee is often made by NPAs which function both as the employer and a provider of employment support services. 86 The Advisory Committee further found that the direct labor ratio potentially conflicts with the definition of CIE, that the direct labor ratio leads to the segregation of workers, and that the JWOD Act does not require or even expect that AbilityOne employment will lead to CIE.”