James Patrick Personal Assistant Services Program
The James Patrick Memorial Work Incentive Personal Attendant Services and Employment Assistance (JP-PAS) Program was created by the Florida Legislature in 2002 as a pilot project. The pilot was a success - and in 2008, JP-PAS was established as a permanent, statewide program in Chapter 413.402, Florida Statutes.
JP-PAS provides monthly stipends to adult Floridians with significant disabilities who require personal assistance services to attain and maintain competitive and integrated employment.
To be eligible for the JP-PAS program, participants must earn an income that is at least 100 percent of the Federal Poverty Level and no more than $150,000 per year. Participants may not receive Supplemental Security Income (SSI) or Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) benefits and they cannot be receiving Medicaid Home and Community-based Services while they are enrolled in the program.
The JP-PAS Program is funded with revenues collected through the Tax Collection Diversion Program, which was established to recover the revenue due from individuals who have not remitted their collected sales tax.
The Tax Collection Diversion Program currently operates out of the Office of the State Attorneys
in eight Florida Judicial Circuits:
Circuit 4 (Duval County)
Circuit 6 (Pinellas County)
Circuit 9 (Orange County)
Circuit 11 (Miami-Dade County)
Circuit 13 (Hillsborough County)
Circuit 15 (Palm Beach)
Circuit 17 (Broward County)
Circuit 20 (Lee County)
The Florida Association of Centers for Independent Living (FACIL) receives its authority to administer the JP-PAS Program in chapter 413, F.S.
In collaboration with FACIL, and adjunct to the Florida Department of Education, the JP-PAS Oversight Council is also authorized in chapter 413, F.S. for the purpose of advising FACIL on policies and procedures and recommending the program’s annual operating budget for activities of the association associated with operations, administration, and oversight.
The Oversight Council includes representation from the following organizations and areas of expertise:
- The director of the division or his or her designee;
- A human resources professional or an individual who has significant experience managing and operating a business based in this state, recommended by the Florida Chamber of Commerce and appointed by the Governor;
- A financial management professional, appointed by the Governor;
- A program participant, appointed by the Secretary of Health or his or her designee;
- The director of the advisory council on brain and spinal cord injuries or his or her designee;
- The director of the Florida Endowment Foundation for Vocational Rehabilitation or his or her designee; and
- The director of the Florida Association of Centers for Independent Living or his or her designee.
For more information about the JP-PAS Program, email jppas@floridacils.org
Centers for Independent Living were created to be run by and for people with disabilities, and offer support, advocacy, and information on empowerment in the attainment of independence from a peer viewpoint, a perspective that was hitherto excluded from participation in the discussion and execution of “services for the disabled.”Independent Living activists carried out some of the most daring protests in American civil rights history, including the longest occupation of a Federal building in history, which led to the release of the regulations banning discrimination against people with disabilities in federally funded programs. As Independent Living philosophy took hold nationally and the Disability Rights Movement gained acceptance and political influence, a grassroots movement for a comprehensive disability rights law (the ADA) was implemented.
