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Committee advances bill to expand positive supports workforce through competency pathways and $1 million appropriation
Summary
House File 2722 would change qualification rules for positive support specialists and analysts to allow competency‑based pathways, appropriate $1 million to DHS for a statewide competency program, and expand access to evidence‑based positive supports to reduce hospital and institutional stays. The committee laid the bill over.
House File 2722 was presented to the House Committee for Human Services on April 1 with sponsors and provider witnesses urging changes to positive‑support staff qualifications and an appropriation to build a statewide competency‑based training infrastructure.
The bill would remove restrictive experience requirements adopted after 2019, reintroducing pre‑2019 standards for certain positions, and create a competency‑based training pathway for positive support professionals and analysts. Sponsors and witnesses said rigid two‑year experience requirements and other barriers limit the number of organizations able to provide positive supports — behavioral, person‑centered services designed to reduce challenging behaviors — and contribute to people with complex needs becoming stuck in hospitals.
Witnesses asked for a $1 million appropriation to DHS to establish a statewide competency program that would create accessible training modules, regional mentorship, tools to track competency and a community‑led competency review team. Donna Cobb of AffinityCare and Heather Wilford, a board‑certified behavior analyst with Mainsail Services, detailed how competency‑based pathways would expand the workforce without lowering quality. Dr. Jessica Simisak of the University of Minnesota’s Institute on Community Integration reinforced the need for provider capacity building and competency models to improve access, especially in Greater Minnesota.
Committee members adopted the A‑1 amendment to the bill and laid House File 2722 over for further consideration; the appropriation and competency program design were left for subsequent budget negotiations and DHS implementation work.
