Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to the Health and Human Services session today where we will be discussing two pieces of legislation introduced by my colleague, Councilmember Don Ludke.

We are joined by our other committee member, Mr.

Councilmember Andrew Friedson.

So we will be talking about two items focused on supporting and strengthening services for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities across Montgomery County.

Before we begin, I just want to share a quick reminder that today's session is being televised live on County Cable Montgomery and streamed on the council's website.

The first item that we will be discussing is Bill 28-26, Health and Sanitation, Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Commission membership appointment terms and amendments.

Our first item regarding the IDD commission will address membership appointments and terms to ensure the commission remains effective, representative and aligned with community needs.

I will let Mr.

Ogorzelec brief us on the staff report and key provisions of the bill.

And then we will hear from the bill sponsor, Councilmember Ludgey.

Thank you very much, Chair Sales.

This bill would revise the structure of the voting members on the commission.

Presently, there are 11 of those 19 members must either be individuals with IDD or family members, guardians, or support staff of the V of individuals with IDD.

The revised structure would expand the scope of those 11 members up to 15 members, which would bring the total commission number of voting numbers from 19 to 23.

And it would that those 15 members would be divided as five individuals with IDD, five individuals who again fall into that family or guardians of individuals with IDD, and then a third tranche of five members who come from either of those two categories.

And I would also note that the bill would require that at least three of those 15 total members be individuals who participate in self-directed services, which is a term defined in state law.

The only impact statement so far is the fiscal impact, which indicates uh no impact.

Uh, there were multiple speakers at uh public hearing, all of whom testified in support.

And there is one amendment.

I don't know, Councilmember Ludke.

Do you want to discuss that first or would you like me to introduce that?

Uh sure.

At the time the bill was introduced, um, the our committee here all assembled.

We had sent a letter to full council announcing the intent of to name the bill after Jake Dedensky, who was one of the original members of the IDD commission, um, and is an individual with a developmental disability who whose advocacy brought this issue forth and who came to our uh public testimony on the bill again to continue advocating on behalf of those um in the community who are most affected and whose voices need to be elevated rather than having others speak on their behalf.

So that is why we um requested to add an amendment to change the name of the bill, um, which would allow us to call it the Jake Dedinski Advocacy Act.

Thank you.

And nothing further from staff.

Uh thank you, Ms.

Del Gorzalek.

And if there are no further comments or questions, we move to approve to recommend this to the full council.

Do we need to take a look at the uh vote?

Okay.

Can we uh yeah, I move to approve.

Make the motion.

Thank you.

All those in favor, raise your hand.

Free nothing as amended.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right.

Moving along, that brings us to our second bill, 1226.

Or welcoming Christine Wellens and our director of aging and disability services, Dr.

Patrice McGee and Miss Mayo.

Thank you so much for joining us.

I wanted to um just briefly share the Bill 2820.

Bill 1226 focuses on payments to service providers for persons with developmental disabilities.

Ensuring our service providers have reliable and sustainable support is critical to maintaining high quality care and resources for vulnerable residents.

I will turn this over to Council staff, Ms.

Wellins, to present the staff report on Bill 1226, and then we will hear from Dr.

McGee and Ms.

Mayo before hearing from council colleagues.

Great.

Thank you so much, Madam President, and thank you.

Council members, good afternoon.

Bill 1226 is entitled Finance Payments to Service Providers with Persons with Developmental Disabilities and relates to the as the chair explained the supplemental payments that go from the county to providers with for persons with developmental disabilities.

The bill was introduced by the council president at the request of the county executive on February 10th, 2026, a public hearing occurred on March 10th.

And this bill, as proposed, is as I understand it, and as explained by the county executive, intended really to uh clean up some of the provisions of current law in order to align with current budgetary practices.

The bill really does two things.

Uh, one is it um updates the language by eliminating a required recommendation that is made annually by DHHS to the council and to the county executive based on uh recommending the amount of the payments to the service providers based on uh certain specified metrics.

And um, in addition, it would delete that because those metrics and that process is not reflective of how the current process works.