I’m excited to share the 2022-2024 Hamilton County Developmental Disabilities Services Strategic Plan. This long-term plan ensures we move beyond our day-to-day work and focus on the future we hope to see for people with DD in Hamilton County.  It will inform our decision-making and guide our path as we strive to achieve these goals.

This plan is the culmination of a year-long process of listening to and gathering feedback from all of our stakeholders: people with developmental disabilities, family members and caregivers, providers, HCDDS employees, and community partners. We distributed several surveys with questions tailored to specific audiences. We hosted focus groups to delve into important issues. We also joined existing workgroups and community partner meetings to gather feedback. We heard from more than 350 people, and our strategic planning team spent weeks distilling what we heard into common themes that are responsive to the diverse needs of our stakeholders.

Our 2022-2024 Strategic Plan identifies four major focus areas:

• Guidance Through Life Stages
• Empowerment of People with Developmental Disabilities, Families, and Staff
• Community Engagement and Equitable Access
• Long-Term Sustainability of High-Quality Support

Each focus area describes the outcomes we’re striving for and the work we’ll do throughout the next three years. You’ll also notice themes that run through all four focus areas including using technology as a tool for innovation and measuring the success of our initiatives. By focusing on key indicators of success, we will expand what works and adjust what isn’t.

Each strategic area also recognizes the systemic shifts impacting how we support people with developmental disabilities, including ongoing provider staffing shortages, increased remote support and assistive technology options, and the expansion of inclusion and advocacy efforts in our community.

The strategic plan is just one part of our continuous planning process . You can see the concrete action steps for each of these strategic focus areas in our Annual Plan. And you can see the progress we made toward our goals in our Annual Report, which is released each spring and looks back at progress over the previous year.

As you look through each section of the 2022-2024 Strategic Plan, I hope you’re able to see yourself and your vision of the future. We’re proud of this ambitious plan, and we’re incredibly thankful to everyone who participated in the planning process. Working together, we can create a brighter future for people with disabilities in our community.