For thousands of Pennsylvania families, the wait for help at home just got measurably shorter. On Thursday, October 30, the Shapiro Administration announced in Harrisburg that the emergency waiting list for intellectual disabilities and autism (ID/A) waiver services has been reduced by 2,742 people since February 2024 — down from 4,592 people to 1,850 still waiting, so the emergency list now stands at about 40 percent of its former size. Five counties — Clarion, Forest, Lawrence, Potter and Warren — have eliminated their emergency waitlists altogether, and more than 42,000 Pennsylvanians with intellectual disabilities and/or autism now receive services in their home and community, the highest number ever recorded in the state.

“When we reduce and eliminate the emergency waitlist for adults with intellectual disabilities and autism, it means they are receiving the critical services they need when they need them,” said Pennsylvania Department of Human Services (DHS) Secretary Dr. Val Arkoosh. “Thanks to the ongoing support of Governor Shapiro and of county administrators, we have been able to reduce the waitlist for services by an unprecedented amount, and our work will continue.” The figures cover the emergency list — adults whose need for services is classed as most urgent — and the department was careful to present them as progress toward a goal, not the end of waiting lists in Pennsylvania altogether.

What these waiver services actually are

Pennsylvania's ID/A waivers are Medicaid home- and community-based services: publicly funded supports that let adults with intellectual disabilities and autism live safely and independently in their own homes and communities instead of institutions. DHS says the services help people pursue education and job opportunities and take part in what the department calls the “Everyday Lives” they deserve. Much of the hands-on help is delivered by direct support professionals — DSPs — the workers who assist with daily living, transport, jobs and community life. For years, the department says, many Pennsylvanians waited for these services because capacity and funding were limited: there were not enough funded places, and not enough DSPs to staff them.

How the list was cut: money for wages and places

Governor Josh Shapiro launched a Multi-Year Program Growth Strategy with the stated goal of completely eliminating the emergency waiting list for adults with intellectual disabilities and autism. In his 2024-25 budget — his second budget — he secured what the administration calls a historic $354.8 million in state and federal funding for ID/A services. In the administration's breakdown of that investment, about $280 million went to raise the rates paid to service providers so they could raise DSP wages, and about $74.8 million went to begin clearing the emergency waiting list by funding new service capacity. The department says the rate increases let providers raise wages and recruit more successfully, cutting the DSP job vacancy rate to its lowest level since 2015 — a workforce point that matters because a funded place without a worker to staff it does not shorten anyone's wait.

Five counties clear — and a county-run system

The five counties that have eliminated their emergency waitlists — Clarion, Forest, Lawrence, Potter and Warren — are all smaller, largely rural counties in western and northern Pennsylvania, and DHS credited county administrators alongside the Governor for the reduction. Pennsylvania's ID/A system is administered locally through counties, which is why progress arrives county by county rather than all at once: the statewide figure of 1,850 people still waiting is the sum of very different local lists, some now at zero and others still working down. In April 2026 the Governor also signed three executive orders expanding protections for Pennsylvanians with disabilities and autism and created a new Governor's Advisory Commission on People with Disabilities.

Why a waiting list existed at all

Demand for home- and community-based services has grown for years as families choose support at home over institutional care, while the number of funded waiver places and the supply of support workers lagged behind. The result, in Pennsylvania as in many states, was a queue — and at the front of it an “emergency” category for adults whose circumstances could not safely wait. That is the list that has now fallen from 4,592 to 1,850. The announcement does not claim that every Pennsylvanian who wants ID/A services now receives them immediately; it reports the emergency adult list specifically, and presents the remaining 1,850 as work still to do.

What happens next

The administration's stated finish line is a zero emergency waitlist, and its 2026-27 budget maintains the funding for DSP wages that underpins the current pace. An earlier budget proposal from the Governor would add $30 million in state funding and $36.2 million in federal funding to expand home- and community-based capacity for adults with ID/A, which the administration estimated could enroll up to 1,625 additional people in waiver services — the next tranche that would cut into the remaining 1,850. Whether that pace holds depends on providers' ability to keep hiring DSPs in a tight labour market, and on counties continuing to convert funding into staffed places. For families still waiting — including Punjabi diaspora families in Pennsylvania caring for an adult son, daughter or sibling with a disability — the practical meaning of Thursday's announcement is simple: the queue ahead of them is 2,742 people shorter than it was in February 2024.