OILP Quarterly Connection
September 23, 2021

>> CAROL EUBANKS: Good afternoon, everyone.  I'm going to wait about 15 seconds to make sure the whole audience is connected before we start any content.  All right.  Thanks for your patience.  Welcome to today's presentation.  I'm Carol Eubanks with ILRU.  We are recording today's presentation so it can be viewed on demand.  We have captioning and ASL interpreters.  You can view the captioning by selecting the CC tab on the Zoom platform.  You can make that box larger by clicking the arrow in the top right‑hand corner.  If you still would prefer to have a larger font, I recommend you check out the full‑screen CART captioning.  You can find the URL in the chat on the main webinar screen.  Also, if you are on the full‑screen CART captioning today, there's a chat option there.  You want to make sure you are in side‑by‑side mode so you can see the speakers and interpreters.  Only the active speakers will have their cameras activated as we're doing right now.  You will always see the active speaker and the active ASL interpreter.  

Today you will also have an opportunity to ask questions using the Q&A tab in the Zoom platform.  You can click there to submit questions any time during the presentation, and these will be addressed directly or at the end of the presentation.  And now I'd like to turn the meeting over to Sean Barrett, Team Lead, Office the Independent Living Programs at the Administration For Community Living at the U.S. department Of Health and Human Services.  Take it away, Sean.  
>> SEAN BARRETT: Thank you.  I'm going to be quick so we can jump into this.  Thank you, everybody, for joining us.  It's a super busy time of the year for all of us.  So, thank you for making the time to join our Grantee Quarterly Connection today.  Just a few quick things, we'll try to have time at the end for questions and answers.  If you could put those in the Q&A thing at the bottom of the screen, that would be great.  The chat will probably be flowing fast and frenetic, so it's going to be really hard to track questions in there.  If you have uses of CDC vaccine funds stories that you would like to share that you did not email, please feel free to put those in the chat.  And with that, I am going to stop talking and turn it over to Alison Barkoff, acting administration and assistance secretary.  Take it away, Alison.  
>> ALISON BARKOFF: Great.  Thanks, Sean.  It's great to be with everybody at this quarterly meeting.  And I really, first, want to start off by thanking all of you.  I know you have worked so hard throughout this pandemic including over the last quarter.  I am sure for so many of you, like us, we had hoped we'd be at a different place in the pandemic.  And I know that the incredible work that you've been doing to help people access vaccines, the work that you've been doing to help transition people out of nursing homes and other congregate settings back to the community, helping people with housing needs, employment needs, a whole range of things, that the needs have continued to grow.  So just really want to thank you for the ongoing hard work and creativity and really for the strength of continuing on during, you know, these ongoing and challenging times.  
	I just want to hit on a couple things at the start of the call.  The first thing I want to start with at a high level, and I think we'll have staff from both AOD and from our Center on Management and Budget talk in a few minutes.  But I wanted to make sure that everybody was aware ‑‑ I know Sean has sent out to everyone the changes that we have made in the process for changes in key personnel policy.  I just really want to flag this as a place where ‑‑ I know a number of you reached out to me when I first joined AOD with questions about the process and policy and really as a whole leadership team, we looked across all of ACL to figure out how we could ensure that we had consistency across the entire agency and put in place policies that worked for everyone.  And really want to emphasize that was our goal here that supersedes any other policies that were previously in place and really looking forward to the opportunity to have both folks from AOD and our Center on Management and Budget walk you through that.  
	The next thing I just want to talk about, I'm really excited to keep hearing the great work that y'all have been doing around COVID vaccine education and access and I'm particularly excited to see so many of the partnerships that are happening between SILs and other ACL grantees in so many communities.  I want to let you know that we are in ACL working very closely with the White House and across all of HHS as recommendations are coming to the forefront around boosters.  We are absolutely committed to making sure that in whatever rollout strategies there are, that we are both reaching people in the whole range of congregate settings where older adults and people with disabilities are, as well as reaching people who are in their own homes in the community who might need support to be able to access boosters.  As soon as we know the recommendations that come from CDC, we will be making sure that we are communicating as clearly as possible information from ACL to stakeholders as well as to our grantees and very much am looking forward to working with you on continuing that important work.  The next thing I just want to highlight that was really starting to come to fruition in the last quarter is the ongoing work that ACL is doing with HUD.  I know access to affordable, accessible, integrated housing is a huge priority for SILs and can be a huge barrier to the work that you all do transitioning people from nursing homes and other institutional settings back to the community and helping keep people stably housed.  I wanted to make sure people were aware of the HHS HUD document that we led in ACL and put out as part of the ADA anniversary in late July called Advancing Community Living Through Coordination Between Housing and Voluntary Community Services.  When I'm done talking, I'll put a link in the chat if people haven't seen it before, but it really talks about both the funding that is available, both for services and for accessible, affordable housing that came out of the American Rescue Plan and, of course, there is ‑‑ we are keeping our eyes on what's happening in Congress where hopefully there will at some point be more additional housing resources and serving resources ‑‑ service resources.  We're collaborating with HUD and working towards hopefully later this year launching a joint housing and services technical assistance center, and we'll look forward to sharing more information with you about that.  But certainly, a main goal here is to bring together all of our grantees, the state agencies on the service side and the state and local housing agencies to be able to develop partnerships and support information sharing and learning collaboratives.  
	And then the last thing ‑‑ and I think Sean will put this into the chat too ‑‑ we know that many of you are working with folks who may be experiencing housing instability, could be facing eviction as the CDC's moratorium on evictions ended last month after a ruling from the Supreme Court.  We have a webinar that we'll be doing on September 30 with ACL, with HUD, the Consumer Finance and Protection Bureau, CFPB, to share information and to share some experiences of how our networks, including an SIL, is working to help people who are potentially facing eviction.  Along these same lines, I know many of you have been engaged at the state level in plans as stakeholder input and plans from your state about how they will be using the increased funding for home and community‑based services.  That was part of the American Rescue Plan.  Also on September 30, a different time, though, we will be holding a webinar with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services about how states are using this increased funding, and we'll be hearing from a couple states.  And we'll make sure that folks have that information in case that's of interest.  
	And then one other thing, if folks are not already signed up and haven't seen, ACL has moved to a new listserv.  And I'm sorry, my kids are walking in the door.  So, apologies for the dog barking in the background.  We are on a new listserv.  If people have not had an opportunity to sign up for that, I really encourage you to.  We really are increasing both the volume and the type of information that we are sharing related to key disability issues.  And one thing that in addition to things like these webinars that we're sharing there, we have started a biweekly policy roundup where we really are trying to share information in more accessible language about federal policies that are coming out, opportunities for public comment, and trying to really explain how they impact the disability community.  And then finally, I'll just end by saying we all are, of course, closely watching the next fiscal year's budget.  And I'll just say that, you know, we are really pleased that the President's budget includes an increase ‑‑ substantial increase in funding to SILs.  We hope that you recognize that that really shows how important we think your work is.  We know the work that you do is just so in demand.  There's so much unmet need.  And we, of course, are closely tracking that budget.  So, with that, I will turn it back over to Sean.  
>> Sean, you're on mute.  
>> SEAN BARRETT: There we go.  I am going to just quickly move this to Jennifer Johnson, Acting Director of OILP.  
>> Hi, everyone.  Good afternoon.  This is Jennifer Johnson.  As Sean said, I'm the Acting Director of OILP as well as the Deputy Commissioner for the Administration on Disabilities.  Glad to be here with you today.  Just to give you a visual description, I am a white middle‑aged woman.  My hair is straight, and its salt and pepper gray.  I also have glasses on and some earrings and sort of a rose‑colored shirt on.  So, like I said, I'm glad to be with you all today, and I'm glad that you are able to join us.  I, too, want to thank all of you for your continued work supporting people with disabilities through this pandemic.  We thought we were turning a corner with the pandemic, but then the delta variant came along, which seems to be a bit of a setback for all of us including a setback for people with disabilities.  And we know just how vitally important your work is to the individuals you are working with and that you continue to be a lifeline to many people with disabilities and managing through the pandemic and also as we recover from the pandemic.  So, again, thank you for all that you are doing every day.  
	I wanted to share a few updates from the office.  One update I'm sure everyone is wondering about, as I mentioned, I am the Acting Director or OILP.  That is because we are recruiting for a new Director for the office.  You may recall, we updated you at the last grantee quarterly connection about the position.  We had to repost the original announcement because we really didn't get many qualified candidates when we originally posted the announcement for the position.  So, when we reposted it, we fortunately got more candidates who were found eligible.  So that was good.  We were really glad to see that not only did we get a great response, we had a lot of people apply.  But this time people were found eligible for the position which has allowed us to start interviewing candidates for the Director's role.  We have completed round one of the interviews, and we are currently in round two of the interviews.  And while I, of course, can't say much about the interview process, we are prioritizing experience with IL.  I wanted to provide updates on CDC funding.  Alison did talk about this a little bit.  But, you know, it's just great to hear about the work that is going on with not only the CDC funding but also the CARES Act funding and the ways in which you all are being innovative and helping people cope during the pandemic but also in terms of getting access to the vaccine.  So, we'll talk a little bit more about this, but just please keep the stories coming.  Those stories are really important for us to be able to share with our partners including CDC.  We are meeting with them regularly, and they really enjoy hearing about the ground‑level work that you all are doing and the connections you are making to individuals and helping them get vaccinated.  But also bubbling up some of the issues that you are facing at the community level.  It's important for us to know about those.  So, we can work with our partners at the federal level to have those addressed.  So just again, really encouraging you to send those stories to your project officers.  The good and the bad.  I also just wanted to highlight the work that is being done with the disability information and access line or DIAL.  This is a new resource that was established using the money that we received from CDC.  This is a resource center for people with disabilities right now focused on getting information about vaccines but also referral to local resources including SILs if they need that kind of assistance.  
	We have several partners that are involved with DIAL and supporting their efforts, and that includes April and Nickel and ILRU.  So, we've had great partnerships with the IL community in getting DIAL launched.  Since launching in June, we've really seen a great success with this resource center.  They have received over 3,000 contacts in the time that they've been operating.  So that's really impressive, given that this is something that started from scratch, and they didn't have a whole lot of time to establish.  They're receiving about 300 calls a week, and generally the calls are focused on getting information about vaccines and also a lot of times they're requesting information about in‑home vaccinations or assistance with getting to a site to get vaccinated.  But some of them are calling not only with questions about vaccines but also other questions such as needs related to housing or food assistance or other kinds of social supports.  So, it is serving multiple purposes.  
	If people are being referred to programs in the states, most often they are being referred to SILs.  So that's great to know that SILs are seen as a resource to people who are calling in.  And we also want to hear from you how it's going.  If you've received any referrals that you're aware of from DIAL, have those referrals gone well, or has it not been an appropriate referral?  So, we want to make sure we have that feedback loop and know from your perspective how things are going.  I just wanted to touch on briefly about vaccine requirements because our staff had been receiving questions from some vaccines about how the President's orders on vaccines apply to SILs.  And there's basically three that have come out.  There's one that basically says that all federal contractors need to be vaccinated.  There's another one that applies to Medicare and Medicaid and basically people working in institutional settings such as nursing homes need to be vaccinated.  And then businesses with 100‑plus employees also need to require people to be vaccinated or if they can't be vaccinated, to demonstrate the reason why.  
	Just to offer some clarification there, our Centers for Independent Living and our Independent Living service grantees are not contractors.  They are grantees, so the requirement for federal contractors to be vaccinated would not apply to any of the IL programs because, again, they're all grant programs.  What we're not sure of is the other two requirements that have come out from the President in terms of the institutional settings and the businesses with 100‑plus employees.  But we are working with our partners in HHS to better understand how these requirements might be applied, and we'll be sure to get information out to you as soon as we can.  So more to come on that as we have it.  So, I'm going to turn it over now to Sean to provide some updates as well.  Thanks.  
>> SEAN BARRETT: All right.  I'm going to stop for a quick second here.  I see a comment, they can't see the interpreters anymore.  I can see them, but I'm a panelist, so can we just do a little check‑in right now?  Can people see the interpreter?  All right.  Let's take a little break while we figure that out.  I'll turn my camera off.  If you're a panelist and you're not presenting, please go ahead and turn your camera off.  I'll turn it over to the ILRU staff to address this.  
>> SHARON FINNEY: Everyone should see the interpreter now.  This is Sharon.  
>> SEAN BARRETT: Okay.  Great.  Okay.  Oh, technology.  What can you do?  Can you see the interpreter now that my image is up?  Let's go ahead and take down the ‑‑ there we go.  Okay.  Perfect.  I'm going to go on now.  I just wanted to give a quick update on reporting.  Thank you, everybody, who participated in the Q90 beta test.  There were a group of SILs and SILCs and DSEs who are ‑‑ who were presenting ‑‑ or, sorry, who were part of a test group to check the new PPR rollout.  Thank you for that.  That provided some key feedback.  Sorry, the Chat going on here.  We're going to go ahead and just keep plugging through here.  As long as you can hear me and see the interpreter, you can get the data.  If there's another answer, we'll work on that.  
	As you all should know, the Q90 portal went up for both DSEs and SILs last week.  We can report as of today 40 total have completed their PPRs and many more are in the process of being worked on.  As was put in the chat ‑‑ or, sorry, in an email to you, please, if you have any questions about accessing Q90 or the database system, please send those to Q90.  You should have the contact information to do that.  In an email.  If you don't have it, please reach out to your PO.  The deadline for submitting those will be November 1.  Please let us know in the Q90 if you're having technological problems.  And keep in mind that was the ‑‑ that was the ‑‑ for the PPRs that were normally absent losing the system last year, that would have been due last year.  We will then reopen it after that for you to begin to enter your PPRs that will be due at the end of this year that will cover the fiscal year that ends in two weeks.  So, there you go.  All right.  I'm going to go ahead and turn my camera off.  I'm seeing the chat.  Hopefully that helps to see the interpreter.  I can see the interpreter.  I just want to let you know, sorry for the technical problems.  All of these are recorded, and there will be a transcript that will be available on ILRU tomorrow.  
	Before I move this over to Regina Blye for the next thing, I want to just take a pause here and see if there's anything ‑‑ ILRU staff, is there anything we need to do technologically?  People are reporting they can't see the interpreter.  
>> SHARON FINNEY: Sean, this is Sharon.  We have pinned our interpreter.  It may be a Zoom issue.  We're working on it.  We are going to spotlight the interpreter so everyone can see the interpreter.  Spotlighting the interpreter will then eliminate the possibility of seeing the presenter.  You will hear them, and you will see the captioning in the Zoom platform and in the StreamText, but you will not see both the interpreter and the speaker.  
>> SEAN BARRETT: Well, I'm not crushed with my mug not being on the screen, so as long as we can move on and make sure everybody gets the information they need.  Thank you.  So, we are going to move quickly now to Regina Blye talking about the process of SPIL amendments.  I want to point out real quick here that we have a question that was posed.  Are the proposed SIL administration increases designated to start up new centers for independent living, or are they proposed to support existing centers for independent living?  The answer to that question, which I realize I'm putting Regina a little on the spot here, is it depends on what your SPIL says.  So, if you need to make an amendment, then this next information that you're about to get from Regina will be very helpful.  No pressure, Regina.  
>> REGINA BLYE: Oh, isn't that so timely, Sean.  Thank you so much.  Hi, everyone.  I'm Regina Blye.  I am the ILS Program Officer for ACL.  For those that may be able to see me, I'm a Black female wearing a black jacket with a blue top.  I have on brown/black earrings that are dangling.  My locks are brownish red.  And my hair's up in a ponytail.  Background, there is an eclectic bookshelf with lots of knickknacks and distractions, and happy to be here.  
	So first I would like to start out by congratulating everyone for completing the first year of the SPIL.  Congrats, congrats.  It took a lot of coordinated, hard work, but you made it.  By now most of the SILCs have reviewed the SPIL or getting started.  And doing your review or while monitoring the SPIL, you might realize the need for an amendment.  So, if so, please refer to the SPIL instructions for a list of steps to initiate a SPIL amendment.  So, if you do not have the instructions, I'll include the template in the chat so that you can refer to the SPIL amendment process that's included in the instructions.  The steps are pretty lengthy, so you'll want to plan ahead so that you could determine the resources that are needed, also the people that need to be involved, and also whether you need to have a public hearing before writing your amendment.  
	To date, we have a total of eight states that have either inquired about a SPIL amendment process, indicated plans to amend the SPIL, or have successfully submitted a SPIL amendment.  And I would like to shout out Sadie Simone.  She's the Massachusetts SILC coordinator.  She's the person who submitted the SPIL amendment on behalf of the state network.  And she followed the steps correctly.  She did it so well that while I was on leave, staff were able to pick up and be able to approve the amendment so that they could move forward with the changes as indicated.  
	So, if you have questions about the types of amendments, that's where you can come to me and ask me questions about whether or not you are to move forward with a technical amendment, which does not require a public hearing, or if you need a substantial amendment, which will require a technical ‑‑ which will require a public hearing.  You will have to get signatures from all of the parties in the state.  So, again, you'll want to plan ahead of time to make sure that you are able to secure and obtain all of the signatures needed prior to submitting the SPIL.  If you have questions about the ‑‑ about something specific that requires technical assistance, you can also reach out to ILRU so that they can assist you with anything specific about any issue that you would like to have addressed.  
	I am here to answer any questions any time, so you are able to email me, or you can call me if you want to walk through the steps that are included in your SPIL instructions.  That's all that I have today for the SPIL update.  I just really wanted to make sure that everyone is aware that there is a process that is outlined in your instructions, and that if you have questions, please feel free to do so.  I do kind of imagine that we will have more requests for amendments as you move forward to your second year of the SPIL.  So, I want to make sure that you get ahead of the curve and make sure that you have enough time to be able to address whatever it is that you need to in order to submit a timely amendment.  Thank you and that's all I have.  
>> Sean, you're still on mute.  
>> SEAN BARRETT: You would think after a year and a half of this, I would remember that.  Just real quick, I apologize I didn't mention this earlier.  I am a 51‑year‑old male with dark hair, Caucasian, sitting in a standard cubicle world.  Lights and gray and white behind me.  So, thank you very much for that, Regina.  And to kind of recap and tie that back to the question, Section 3.2 of your SPIL indicates ‑‑ and part of it indicates what would happen in a state if more funds became available than would be covered by meeting last year's funding level and adding a cost-of-living increase.  So, if the amount of appropriation in any given year is more than what you had last year plus the cost of living, then we will go to 3.2 of your SPIL to look to see what should happen next.  So, the question about what would happen if there were these big, proposed increases, 3.2 of your SPIL.  Great.  
>> REGINA BLYE: Sean, can I step in?  I forgot about the question.  Thank you so much.  And this is the type of question that you can come to me with, and I'll try to help you out, and also to let you know if there are other places in the SPIL where you might need to have some changes as well as looking at the funding table that's in Section 1.5, or if it might require you to have to change your goals and objectives.  That's the type of information that I can help walk you through to make sure that you're addressing everything that needs to be addressed when you're considering a SPIL amendment.  Thank you, Sean.  
>> SEAN BARRETT: No problem.  That's why we're a team.  Great.  Okay.  I am going to move this along now and turn it over to Yi‑Hsin and Gina from our office of operations.  I'm not sure which one of you will be talking about the recent changes.  And outline the new policy.  
>> I think I'm up first, actually, before we turn it over to Gina and Yi‑Hsin.  
>> SEAN BARRETT: Great.  Thank you.  Take it away.  
>> Jennifer: Okay, thank you.  This is Jennifer once again.  And so, as Sean said, we wanted to take some time during today's call to explain the updated guidance that Alison mentioned earlier that went out earlier this month from Rasheed Williams who is the Deputy Administrator for Management and Budget here in the Administration for Community Living.  This updated guidance was addressing how recipients of ACL‑funded grants should make a request for changes in key personnel.  And as Alison said, this guidance supersedes previous guidance to SILs about changes in key personnel and will take effect October 3.  So, on October 3, all ACL grantees are expected to follow this guidance.  
	And the guidance is based on federal grant rules and regulations that are issued by the office Of Management and Budget, or OMB.  And these are grant rules and regulations that apply to all federal grants.  And so, under the grant rules, there are rules that apply to what we call post‑award amendments, which basically are changes to the grant after the grant has been awarded.  And the rule requires grantees to submit to the funding agency, or in this case ACL, a request when there are changes in key personnel.  So, we need to have a process in place to meet those requirements.  And so, the guidance that went out earlier in September is basically outlining the process that we will follow when you have changes in key personnel.  And those changes may include when a new director is hired or when there is a change in status of key personnel.  Change in status may be something like key personnel being absent for any period of time, three months or more, or their time being reduced on the project by 25% or more.  Those are all circumstances under which we would be notified of those kinds of changes.  And basically, this requirement is in place to ensure that there is communication between the grantee and the federal government about the change in key personnel so that we are aware of any kind of change to key personnel on the grant.  And it is basically there to ensure that the grantee maintains key personnel and has a plan in place where there are gaps or changes in key personnel.  And I want to be clear that this requirement and our process is different from the kind of approval that would get in the way of the hiring of a new SIL Executive Director.  It is not the kind of approval that will interfere with the SIL Board of Directors, consumer control of the organization.  And the Board of Directors of an SIL hiring an Executive Director.  This updated guidance does not give ACL the authority to approve or disprove the ‑‑ disapprove the hiring of an SIL Executive Director or key personnel on any of the ACL grants.  But we will continue to have procedures in place for circumstances where someone may have been disbarred, and we will notify the SIL if we find that to be the case.  
	We've asked staff from our Office of Fiscal Operations to join today's call and take you through the process for submitting this request for when you have changes in key personnel.  So, I'm going to turn it over now to Gina, I believe I'm turning it over to you, correct?  
>> Gina: Yes.  Thank you.  Hi, Jennifer.  Good afternoon, everyone.  I am Gina Mattrassi from the Office of Fiscal Operations under Center for Management and Budget.  And I'd like to take this time to speak briefly to the process for submitting requests for change in key personnel.  A guidance document on process was included, an email that was sent, and a special clause for this requirement will be included in all grant agreements with a link to instructions on the ACL website on how to request a change in key personnel.  There are two different processes depending on your grant program.  For part B, grants, all requests should be submitted via email by the grantee with the required documents to the ACL program representative for confirmation, the ACL program representative will acknowledge the change in key personnel within ten business days, and then forward the request and coordinate closely with the fiscal operations specialist to document the change.  For part C grants, all requests should be submitted by the grantee via grant solutions, grants management module, as a new amendment and attach required documents.  The ACL program representative will review amendment and coordinate with fiscal operation specialists to make the change.  Also, a link to grant solutions training video showing how to request and manage amendments is included in the guidance document and on the ACL website.  The new key leadership personnel will be included on email correspondence the next time a notice of award is issued.  If you have any further questions on the process, please feel free to reach out to the program office or the Office of Fiscal Operations, and we will be happy to assist you.  Thank you.  
>> Jennifer Johnson: Thank you, Gina.  So, we will continue to roll out information to you all about these updated procedures.  But just wanted to make sure that we took time during this call to explain those to you and, of course, if you have questions, you can reach out to your project officer, and they'll be able to respond to your question.  Thank you.  
>> SEAN BARRETT: Great.  We just got a question in the tab on this topic.  Can you clarify if SILs funded through part B are required to adhere to the new guidance for key personnel?  I believe the answer is no because DSEs are the recipients of the part B funds, not SILCs.  And so, the key personnel listed are the directors or the whoever the grantee lists as the key personnel on the grantee.  And for part B, that's not the SILC.  That's nobody on the SILC.  So, great.  All right.  Let's go ahead here.  We have about 15 minutes left.  We've been actually able to address a lot of the questions that came on board.  In case you missed it, I want to go ahead and answer a few of the questions out loud that were typed in.  First of all, the notice of award is the ‑‑ in old days it was called the Grant Award Notice.  The thing that comes to you and says this is what your NOA award is.  That is in process.  It's getting through the machinery.  I'm not going to put my friends from OFO on the spot here.  But I can tell you that processing 400‑plus awards is a lot of work.  So, we are very confident that everything is in place and will be happening in a timely manner.  Thank you for your patience.  As a former SIL director, it can be nerve‑racking waiting on that.  But there should be no reason to worry that it's not coming.  There you go.  One person put a question in that says that ‑‑ found that not all the SILs in our state had received notice on the PPR submission.  Who shall we be looking for this from?  First of all, the company's name is Q90.  So, the email is something at Q90.com.  You should have also received an email from us, from ACL or OILP recently last week before it went live for Q90 that has the directions on how to contact Q90 if you have any technological issues and logging into Q90 would count that, knowing the password.  So, I put that in the chat.  The database of contacts, especially for SILs ‑‑ well, for everybody ‑‑ that we gave Q90 to reach out was the same one that we used to generate emails to let you know about things like this meeting.  So, if you knew about this meeting, then you're good.  Someone just ‑‑ sorry ‑‑ asked me to repeat the thing about SILCs and the change in personnel new things.  SILCs ‑‑ so part B money, when it funds SILCs, part B money goes to the DSE.  And then the DSE administers that program.  The change in key personnel is to whoever is identified as key personnel.  So, in this case that key personnel for the part B award would be in the DSE, not the SILCs.  So, we know that would not be an SILC thing.  There you go.  And I put all the contact information for Q90 in the chat.  You should have an email about it.  Is there ‑‑ Gloria writes, is there anyone else whose part C funds went down by a few hundred dollars even though our population has increased?  I can tell you that a few hundred dollars in the big pot represents an extraordinarily small percentage of the big thing.  So that could have been maybe other states' populations went up, like, infinitesimal more.  There's more ‑‑ if it's equal funded from one year to another, there are always slight variations, very slight variations just because it's a big country and a teeny, little change on the other side of the country can impact the national funding.  So, there you go.  
	The ‑‑ Regina, did you want to answer that question?  That you're typing about?  
>> REGINA BLYE: Are you referring to the NOA piece?  
>> SEAN BARRETT: Sorry, my screen's just scrolling.  
>> REGINA BLYE: Yes.  I was ‑‑ I mentioned to Sean in chat that the notice of awards for the ILS program will not be issued until after the start of the fiscal year.  I have received a few emails from people wanting to know if they should expect those in the next couple of days.  They typically are not issued until sometimes late October to the 1st of November.  And then also the question about receiving a notice when you submit your PPR, typically what is happening is that you're not going to receive a note that is a your PPR has been submitted.  But if you ‑‑ there is a button that when you click and it is sent, that means that it has been submitted, but you're not going to get an email from Q90 indicating that it has been submitted.  But you should be receiving notices from Q90 about updates or technical updates.  If you're not getting those emails, then you should use that email information and contact information that Sean provided in the chat so that you can ask about getting added to the list if you're supposed to be added.  
>> SEAN BARRETT: Great.  Thank you.  Somebody writes, I am guessing that SILs in states did not directly receive notice about Q90.  723 states for those of you who don't know are the ones ‑‑ there's only two of them ‑‑ who have chosen to administer the part C program themselves.  So, no.  They ‑‑ the group administering it would have gotten the notice, and it would have been their responsibility to reach out and generate the PPRs.  And generate the combined PPR.  So, there you go.  I'll try and scroll down here.  Of course, that didn't work.  All right.  Somebody wrote in, maybe check spam junk folder to see if you didn't get the Q90 email.  I can't tell you how important it is to make sure that somebody in your office is periodically checking your spam and junk mail folder.  It is ‑‑ every year when we send out from us the email that says, here's what you need to do to fill out the continuation paper to get your funding.  Somebody will write a month later, oh, my God, I forgot.  I didn't see it.  It got caught in the spam folder.  So always be checking your spam folder, please.  And if you have the ability to create rules and keep our emails or if we send you an email and say somebody else is sending, I strongly encourage you to do that.  Somebody asked, the PPR ‑‑ for last fiscal year is due November 1.  November 1.  You're welcome.  Somebody put thank you.  Great.  Okay.  So, we're just about out of time.  Oh.  Another question popped up here.  Yes.  Someone said, just a suggestion to maybe send an email out again about the PPR and due dates.  Absolutely we're going to do that.  We know that things are getting a little confusing here with the ‑‑ this ‑‑ last year's PPR is due and then shortly after the next year's PPR is due, and its end of the year reporting time.  So, yes.  Absolutely.  Things are moving fast and furious.  And we are going to send out an email to detail out all the deadlines and all the project periods and all that.  
	Someone writes for verification will Q90 be open for this year's PPR on November 1, 2021, with a deadline?  Great question.  To be completely blunt and honest with you, we want to make sure we get through last year's before we open up the new one.  Let's make sure the new car is running well before we open up and get in the next year's car.  But I think you can anticipate that sometime shortly after November 1, that that will be open.  There you go.  Regina, there's an anonymous attendee posted a question.  Are you saying that the final FY21 installment of our grant award will not arrive until after October 1?  Just need clarification on that.  
>> REGINA BLYE: No.  You ‑‑ there were 26 states that received their final notice of award.  That should have happened, I think, I believe earlier this month or at the end of last month.  The notice of award that I was referring to is for next fiscal year.  You will not receive that one until after October.  But if you did not receive the notice of award for your final allotment, please reach out to me so that I can research that and make sure that you receive it.  And this is referring to the designated state entity that receives the notice of awards from ACL for part B funds.  
>> SEAN BARRETT: Great.  Someone writes, can we get a link to directions to request key personnel change in chat?  I think it's actually in the process of being posted on the web.  We will definitely send that out to everybody when we get it, but I don't think it's on ‑‑ 
>> Jennifer Johnson: Sean, I can put the link that's on our website.  I'll put that in the chat box.  
>> SEAN BARRETT: Great.  Thank you.  Thank you very much.  Everything's kind of in process.  So, thank you.  Good to know.  Somebody posted, when can we expect directions in blank form for PPR in 2021?  It's the same as it was last year.  There were no changes.  And there won't be a form there.  Now we're shifting to the online portal.  So, the form's the same, actually.  There are no changes to the form so you can use what you did before.  Great.  Okay.  Sorry about that.  The ‑‑ you know, we only have a couple minutes left, in case any other questions come floating in here.  We did want to talk a little bit about the CDC vaccine funds.  I encourage you, as always, to send in your stories.  You can send them to your PO.  Always an interesting thing to hear.  It helps us be able to relay successes to other groups.  That's fantastic.  And to be honest, it's nice to read.  So, we're getting a lot of submissions.  I do want to kind of summarize a few.  I do think that there are ‑‑ I do know that there are a lot of groups putting out a lot of different public announcements or PSAs, public service announcements.  A lot of different collaborations with different organizations in the area.  I think that's one of the things across both the CDC vaccine funding and the CARES Act that I've been very impressed with.  The number of times and the number of ways which people leverage resources by partnering with other groups is impressive.  Good job.  And using your space, we've heard about one at a grocery store, basically a little mini‑store to feel more COVID safe.  We've heard a lot of vaccine clinics actually being opened up, sort of pop‑up clinics, where, you know, you go to a spot, like a farmers' market‑type thing.  You kind of have a little pop‑up ‑‑ people come in and get vaccinated.  You do that in partnerships with, like, local fire departments and other providers.  Drugstores, that kind of thing.  So as has been said before, keep up the good work.  We know it's tough.  We know these are unprecedented times.  But you're all, you know, working hard and doing good work.  Thank you very much.  I don't have anything else to add.  Jennifer, do you want to add anything else?  Otherwise, I think we can give people back 3 1/2 minutes of their lives.  
>> Jennifer Johnson: I'll just add that I did put the link to our website where the updated guidance is posted.  If you go to the link, there is a ‑‑ on that page, that it will take you to, there is a section called "Requesting a Grant Amendment."   And if you click on that, it gives you a number of documents that you can link to where there's guidance to different post‑award amendment changes.  And one of those is related to changes in key personnel.  And it will show you the guidance that was sent out in early September.  But I have nothing else to add besides that.  But just, again, to thank you for joining us today.  And thank you for your continued work.  And we really appreciate everything that you are doing every day.  And just continue to keep those stories coming our way because we really appreciate hearing about them.  So, thank you.  
>> Richard Petty: This is Richard Petty at ILRU.  If I may add, an announcement went out from ILRU about funding that will soon be announced in a request for proposal for part B Centers for Independent Living to apply for funds from the Centers For Disease Control, the CDC Foundation, and the disability vaccine access opportunity center to operate and support vaccine access activities for people with disabilities.  That announcement went out today and a request for proposals will be issued shortly.  Thank you.  
>> SEAN BARRETT: Real quick question, Richard, if people have questions ‑‑ and congratulations on that ‑‑ if they have questions about that, whom should they contact?  
>> Richard Petty: They can contact ‑‑ they can contact ILRU on the website.  There will be information they can reach out to us about that.  In the release ‑‑ the announcement has contact information for me, and Kimberly Tissot at ABLE South Carolina.  
>> SEAN BARRETT: Great.  And just so everybody knows, the recordings and transcripts of these grantee quarterly connection calls are made available usually a couple of days afterwards.  Also, on the ILRU website.  When I went to see them, I go there and just type in "Grantee Quarterly Connection" in the search bar.  Great.  
>> Richard Petty: Thank you, Jennifer, Sean and all.  
>> SEAN BARRETT: Thank you, everybody.  
>> Thank you.