Our company, MIA Consulting, was the first to bring services to individuals where they live, thus avoiding unnecessary institutionalization and cost. To achieve economies of scale, our service delivery model first catered to public housing residents, serving a large and permanent concentration of low-income seniors and disabled adults with common needs.

In 1996 MIA launched the nation’s first public housing project in Miami. The project became an overwhelming success overnight. Under this model, that has since helped 40 public housing projects bring assisted living services to their residents, not only the residents, individual providers have flourished in myriad ways:

I spent inordinate amounts of time and effort convincing the departments of Health and Human Services and Housing and Urban Development to forge a partnership and work in unison to replicate our model throughout the U.S. Overcoming communication and policy hurdles became the major obstacle, as providing services to individuals in their homes was not a priority for policymakers or elected officials.

This partnership among federal agencies will facilitate the implementation of this model in all 50 states, so every senior and disabled adult in this country has the opportunity to live their last years with dignity and in their communities. I would welcome any advice as to how to make this happen.