ADDP Workforce Survey Shows Continued Challenges Amid Modest Progress
FRAMINGHAM — Despite incremental improvements over the last year, staffing shortages continue to challenge human-services providers, according to the latest workforce survey released by the Assoc. for Developmental Disabilities Providers (ADDP), a statewide association representing community-based human-services providers.
The survey, conducted in October 2024, is the third in a series that began in March 2023 and includes responses from 76% of ADDP’s member provider organizations. It captures workforce data across a range of residential and day programs supporting individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD), including autism and brain injuries.
“Our survey shows that, while staff vacancy rates have improved for the second year in a row, the demand for human-services employees continues to outpace staffing capacity,” ADDP President and CEO Ellen Attaliades said. “High vacancies across key positions, particularly in nursing and clinician roles, are limiting providers’ ability to deliver services to individuals in need.”
Like past surveys, the data pertains to staffing across six programs operated by ADDP’s members: adult long-term residential, which represents the largest program; day habilitation; community-based day supports (CBDS); supported employment; shared living; and adult foster care.
The overall vacancy rate decreased from 24% in 2023 to 19% in 2024, which is a positive trend driven by reductions in the vacancy rates in shared living (from 28% to 17%) and residential programs (from 26% to 19%). These figures remain exponentially higher than Massachusetts’ overall job-opening rate of less than 5%.
“Vacancies are decreasing, at least in part, because of new state investment in our sector,” Attaliades said. “Higher rates have enabled providers to increase pay for direct support professional positions and remain somewhat competitive. It will be critical to maintain these gains across all human-services positions in the upcoming state budget if we are to make true progress across the board in all programs, some of which have growing waitlists.”
The current residential program staff vacancy rate still represents nearly 3,300 open positions. Vacancy rates in day programs reflect uneven progress. Day habilitation vacancy rates decreased from 20% in 2023 to 16% in 2024, and supported employment also saw modest decreases, with vacancies dropping from 19% to 14%. CBDS vacancies, however, remained stagnant at 20%.
Respondents noted that licensed practical nurses continue to be the most challenging positions to fill as vacancies climbed to 36%, while vacancies for clinicians, who provide therapeutic treatment to individuals, rose to 21%.
Among other key findings, the combined waitlist for new referrals grew from 1,502 in 2023 to 1,682 in 2024, with CBDS and day habilitation programs seeing the greatest increase in demand. All regions of the state reported decreases in staff vacancies, although the Boston metro region experienced only a slight decrease. Nearly 70% of providers reported vacancy rates between 10% and 40%.