This week, you may have had trouble getting in contact with us. Several staff were attending two conferences this week: the Common Ground for Common Good conference in St. Paul, a joint conference between the Minnesota Council of Nonprofits and Minnesota Council of Foundations, and the Age & DIsability Odyssey Conference, a state and national conference for organizations serving people with disabilities and the elderly.

At the Odyssey Conference, we presented our HCBS waiver review work in collaboration with the Minnesota Department of Human Services. Attending were staff from counties around Minnesota and other human service agencies around the country interested in our process for evaluating implementation and outcomes for these complex programs. We enjoyed hearing about other efforts to make sure program participants are achieving both social and health outcomes while staying in the community vs. institutional settings.

At the Common Ground conference, we learned about volunteer program efforts and the need to have better data to both manage volunteers and plan for how best to tap their talent and energy.