THE ALLIANCE MISSION:

To work together to empower children and adults who have developmental disabilities to lead personally fulfilling lives in the community through maximization of Kansas resources.

Guiding Principles

The Alliance believes that:

1. People who have developmental disabilities and their families, guardians, or trusted advisers should be able to learn about community services and service provider options from caring, informed, and objective sources that are free of conflicts of interest, and that respect diverse lifestyle choices.
   
   
2. Persons with developmental disabilities should be able to secure adequate funding for services that are appropriate for their needs, and then direct this funding to the persons or organizations they feel will best help them to achieve personally fulfilling lifestyles in the community.
   
   
3. Persons with developmental disabilities should shape the quality and responsiveness of community service providers, not only by controlling funding, but also by evaluating service provider performance via a customer-driven evaluation system. Feedback should be available to service providers, funding sources, and others seeking community services.
   
   
4. As Kansas delegates administrative functions and methods for allocating tax dollars to pay for services, The Alliance will push for systems and funding that:
   
   
   • Are publically accountable, cost efficient, outcome oriented, and highly responsive to consumers' needs and community choices;
   • Recognize the unique challenges of providing services in various communities;
   • Feature flexible funding sufficient to meet the varying needs of each consumer within the community they choose to live;
   • Ensure that consumers and taxpayers have access to information about community service outcomes; and that those outcomes are customer-centered, measurable, achievable, and utilized for system improvement;
   • Treat all service providers fairly, affording no special powers, funding, or advantages to certain providers that may position them to unfairly compete against other providers;
   • Allow each community service provider to define its own mission, determine the scope of services it provides, fairly market services, and control its own growth in ways to ensure high quality, satisfaction, and financial stability; and
   • Ensure that needed services are identified and developed at the local community level.