The 1997 Workforce Investment Act reformed the national workforce development system and created One Stop Employment Centers in each state. As part of this reform, state vocational rehabilitation agencies and other employment services are brought together to serve individuals with employment training and support needs, including individuals with disabilities. This brief describes a successful partnership between a Social Security Administration-funded Benefits Planning, Assistance and Outreach (BPAO) project and a One Stop agency in Western Massachusetts. The collaboration has resulted in mutual benefit for the agencies and for the One Stop recipients

Malloy, JoAnne

O’Shea, Teresa

Petkauskos, Kathleen  A.

English

The 1997 Workforce Investment Act reformed the national workforce development system and created One Stop Employment Centers in each state. As part of this reform, state vocational rehabilitation agencies and other employment services are brought together to serve individuals with employment training and support needs, including individuals with disabilities. This brief describes a successful partnership between a Social Security Administration-funded Benefits Planning, Assistance and Outreach (BPAO) project and a One Stop agency in Western Massachusetts. The collaboration has resulted in mutual benefit for the agencies and for the One Stop recipients.SS7_PDF1.pdf: 319 downloads, before Oct. 1, 2020.0-SS7_TXT1.txt: 50 downloads, before Oct. 1, 2020

Petkauskos, Kathleen A.

eCommons@Cornell

Promising Practices: BPA&O Collaboration with One-Stop Centers, Part I. Co-location of One Stop and BPA&O Services: Resource Partnership (Massachusetts)

DigitalCommons@ILR

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Work Incentives Support Center
Promising Practices
Creating Model Partnerships to Promote Employment of People with Disabilities
J u n e  2 0 0 5
w w w . e d i . c o r n e l l . e d u
Background
The Beneﬁts Planning, Assistance and Outreach (BPA&O) 
program, established as part of the Ticket to Work and 
Work Incentive Improvement Act of 1999, has created a  
system of specialists in every state who provide individu-
alized beneﬁts and work incentive counseling services to 
social security beneﬁciaries.  The BPA&Os are operated by 
a variety of types of organizations, including centers for 
independent living, state vocational rehabilitation agen-
cies, private, non-proﬁt vocational providers, among oth-
ers. In order to reach a diverse population of individuals 
with disabilities who are interested in employment and to 
cover their geographic areas, the BPA&O projects reach out 
to state, local, private and public vocational agencies and 
schools. 
The goal of the Beneﬁts Planning, Assistance and Outreach 
program is to better enable SSA`s beneﬁciaries with dis-
abilities to make informed choices about work. The BPA&Os 
provide work incentives planning and assistance to SSA`s 
beneﬁciaries with disabilities; conduct outreach efforts to 
those beneﬁciaries and their families who are potentially 
eligible to participate in Federal or State work incentives 
programs and; work in cooperation with Federal, State, and 
private agencies and nonproﬁt organizations that serve 
beneﬁciaries with disabilities1.
BPA&O Collaboration with 
One-Stop Centers, Part I
Contact Information
Cornell University
School of Industrial and Labor Relations
Employment and Disability Institute
201 ILR Extension
Ithaca, New York 14853-3901
t. 607-255-7727
f. 607-255-2763
tty 607-255-2891
ilr_edi@cornell.edu
www.edi.cornell.edu
Promising Practices  |  June 20054
A D V A N C I N G  T H E  W O R L D  O F  W O R K
a car through her PASS Plan, and secured 
employment. This happened because the 
BPA&O Beneﬁts Specialist and the One-Stop 
staff worked as a team to get her what she 
needed to go to work, and it all happened 
in one convenient, totally accessible loca-
tion.  
“This kind of program should be available 
in every One-Stop in the country, to assist 
a population that has been ignored for 
too long,” states Rexene Picard, Executive 
Director of FutureWorks, a One-Stop Career 
Center in Springﬁeld, Massachusetts.
“Having a BPA&O on CareerPoint’s premises 
has increased resource possibilities,” re-
marks David Gadaire, Executive Director of 
CareerPoint. “Since the origin of this rela-
tionship, CareerPoint has been awarded a 
Workforce Incentive Grant, became the ﬁrst 
Career Center in the country to become an 
Employment Network under the Ticket to 
Work program, partnered in a State Alloca-
tion Grant, received Navigator funding, and 
has been asked to trial a DOL Workforce 
Action Grant.”
As one BPA&O/ One-Stop customer stated: 
“I was very pleased to work with the Ben-
eﬁts Specialist at CareerPoint,”. “I liked the 
fact that I was not singled out as a person 
with a psychiatric disability and that I had 
all the services of the Career Center at my 
disposal. I was given prompt, accurate ser-
vice and the counseling helped me clarify 
some misinformation I had received else-
where. I run a consumer support center for 
people with psychiatric disabilities and have 
referred many of them for beneﬁts coun-
seling at the Career Centers in their areas. 
Thank you for your much needed work.”
Co-location of services provides exceptional 
opportunities as highlighted in this 
promising practice. Part II of this brief 
further explores possible collaboration 
strategies between One-Stop and BPA&O 
stafﬁng with the goal of promoting 
employment outcomes for people with 
disabilities served by these two systems.
Endnotes:
1 SSA (2004). The Work Site, BPAO Programs, 
retrieved: http://www.ssa.gov/work/
ServiceProviders/bpaofactsheet.html
2 P.L. 105-220.
3 64 FR 9403-9404 (February 25, 1999).
4 64 FR 9403-9404 (February 25, 1999).
5 20 CFR 662.100(a)
6 Section 134(c) of WIA (29 U.S.C.2864(c)); 20 CFR 
662.100(c).
7 SSA, (2001). Request for Agreement, BPAO 
Services. Federal Register, (66) 4. Retrieved, 
2/21/2005. pp. 1168-1180.
BPA&O Collaboration with One-Stop Centers, Part I
Co-location of One Stop and BPA&O Services:
Resource Partnership (Massachusetts)
JoAnne M. Malloy, Training and Organizational 
Development Specialist, WISC
Kathleen A. Petkauskos, President, Resource Partnership
Teresa O’Shea, Beneﬁts Specialist, Resource Partnership
This is one of a series of articles that have been 
reviewed for accuracy by the Social Security 
Administration (SSA), Ofﬁce of Employment 
Support Programs.  However, the thoughts and 
opinions expressed in these materials are those 
of the authors and do not necessarily reﬂect 
the viewpoints or ofﬁcial policy positions of the 
SSA.
2 Promising Practices  |  June  2005 3Promising Practices  |  June  2005
The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) has also 
undertaken major reform with the passage 
of the Workforce Investment Act (WIA) of 
19982. The WIA requires states to streamline 
services for eligible individuals by integrating 
multiple employment and training programs 
at the “street level” through the creation of 
One-Stop Career Centers. According to DOL, 
eligible individuals include individuals with 
disabilities and other persons with multiple 
barriers to employment3. In order to make ser-
vices available to all customers, the One-Stop 
system must be accessible to persons with dis-
abilities4.  
The One-Stop delivery system is envisioned as 
a system under which One-Stop “partners” 
responsible for administering separate work-
force investment, educational and other hu-
man resource programs and funding streams 
collaborate to create a seamless system of 
service delivery that will enhance access to the 
program’s services and improve long-term em-
ployment outcomes for individuals receiving 
assistance5. The system must include at least 
one comprehensive physical center, that must 
provide core services, in each local area and 
must provide access to other programs and 
activities carried out by One-Stop partners6.   
The One-Stop system has been identiﬁed by 
the Social Security Administration (SSA) as an 
important element in the development and 
implementation of the initiatives set forth 
in the Ticket to Work and Work Incentives 
Improvement Act. The SSA has encouraged 
BPA&Os to collaborate with and become local 
One-Stop partners7. 
Part One of this two-part series on successful 
collaboration between One-Stop Career Cen-
ters and BPA&O projects includes a proﬁle of 
the Resource Partnership, and One-Stop Ca-
reer Centers in western Massachusetts. 
The Challenge: Providing 
Beneﬁts Counseling as Part of 
a Comprehensive Employment 
System
One of the primary challenges for BPA&O 
projects is where, when and how to connect 
with beneﬁciaries who are interested in going 
to work and who need beneﬁts counseling. It 
is particularly difﬁcult to reach out to those 
beneﬁciaries who are not already involved 
with a human service system or who live in 
rural, underserved areas of a BPA&O project’s 
region.  Conversely, one major challenge for 
WIA-funded One-Stop Centers is how to pro-
vide necessary, individualized services to indi-
viduals with disabilities. The One-Stop Centers 
provide WIA core employment services to 
individuals who qualify, however, they do not 
have the in-house beneﬁts counseling exper-
tise to offer customers with disabilities. As 
directed by the WIA, the One-Stops must seek 
out this expertise and make it available.  
One-Stop Center Co-Location: 
Resource Partnership, BPA&O in 
Massachusetts
In western Massachusetts, a BPA&O Beneﬁts 
Specialist approached a One-Stop Career Cen-
ter (CareerPoint in Holyoke) looking for ofﬁce 
space to meet with beneﬁciaries who were 
seeking beneﬁts counseling services. From 
the BPA&O’s perspective, the advantages of 
collaborating with CareerPoint were: Career-
Point’s policy of universal access: Any person 
with a disability was given access, regardless 
of severity or need; CareerPoint is open on 
weekends, which allows access to beneﬁts 
counseling for customers who are working or 
attending school (this is not an option at most 
other state agencies); and CareerPoint’s build-
ing and web sites are accessible. Their com-
puter lab is ﬁtted with adaptive technology to 
accommodate all disabilities. 
Some of the challenges faced when the 
BPA&O ﬁrst started providing services within 
the One-Stops included sharing customer 
information without violating conﬁdential-
ity and reporting outcomes as a result of the 
collaboration. Although data sharing is not a 
requirement of the collaboration, the BPA&O 
provides periodic reports to the One-Stops on 
BPA&O activities. These reports do not include 
speciﬁc client information but they do include 
such things as the number of clients seen, ser-
vices provided, recommendations made, and 
other aggregate demographic information 
such as gender and age. The One-Stops are 
then able to integrate this information into 
their reports as they need. The BPA&O staff  
also encourage beneﬁciaries to explore the 
other services the Career Centers have to offer 
and to sign up to become a member, if they so 
choose. 
Although there is no formal, written agree-
ment or memorandum of understanding be-
tween Resource Partnership’s BPA&O program 
and the One-Stop delivery system, a founda-
tion has been laid for providing needed ben-
eﬁts counseling services to customers with 
disabilities through the One-Stop centers. 
The BPA&O currently pays rent to one Career 
Center in western Massachusetts where the 
Beneﬁts Specialists has ofﬁce space, computer, 
phone, and ofﬁce support services. Career 
Point has since introduced the Resource Part-
nership to ﬁve additional One-Stop Career 
Centers in western Massachusetts, growing 
to a total of 10 Resource Partnership BPA&O/ 
One-Stop Career Center locations across the 
state of Massachusetts.
Collaboration increases the 
customer base 
The collaboration between the Resource 
Partnership BPA&O program and One-Stops 
has been beneﬁcial for all parties involved, 
particularly the customers. The One-Stop 
Career Centers provide customer referrals to 
the BPA&O staff.  In some instances, the Ben-
eﬁts Specialist reports to work in the morning 
with a full schedule of appointments made 
by the Career Center staff. Additionally, the 
One-Stop Career Centers include information 
about beneﬁts counseling and the BPA&O 
services in mailings, brochures, orientation 
packets and sessions and on their websites, 
increasing the BPA&O’s visibility and outreach 
efforts. The Career Centers have also shared 
the costs or provided ASL interpreters or 
Spanish language interpreters for the Beneﬁts 
Specialists when they worked with One-Stop 
customers. Additionally, BPA&O staff have 
been invited to participate, at no cost to the 
BPA&O, in One-Stop technology trainings. 
Collaboration improves the quality 
of services
Collaboration between the BPA&O program 
and the One-Stop Career Centers enables 
on-site beneﬁts counseling to One-Stop cus-
tomers as part of their job search.  Beneﬁts 
Specialists provide ongoing counseling and 
technical assistance on beneﬁts/work incen-
tives issues to One-Stop Career Center custom-
ers and staff. 
“The contribution of the Resource Partner-
ship’s Beneﬁts Specialist has become the cor-
nerstone of our center’s efforts to increase 
BPA&O Collaboration with One-Stop Centers, Part I
services to customers with disabilities,” states 
David Gadaire, Executive Director of Career-
Point. “The number of customers with dis-
abilities our center serves has increased four 
fold, and the average number of services each 
customer receives now surpasses that of our 
non-disabled customer base.”
The Beneﬁts Specialists contribute as members 
of the One-Stop disability committees and as 
participants at staff meetings. The Resource 
Partnership is also active on the Workforce In-
vestment Board (WIBs are a required element 
of the One-Stop system), providing expertise 
and input and therefore enhancing Career 
Center services to customers with disabilities. 
“The presence of Beneﬁts Specialists at each 
Career Center has been an excellent outreach 
and recruitment tool for encouraging job 
seekers with disabilities to use One-Stop ser-
vices,” states Brad Sperry, Associate Director of 
the Hampden County Regional Employment 
Board. “State VR agencies and their subcon-
tracted providers are more likely to refer job 
seekers to a Career Center knowing that their 
customers will be provided accurate and time-
ly information on beneﬁts management. Most 
importantly, job seekers that have had good 
experiences at a Career Center tell their peers 
and this stimulates ‘word of mouth’ referrals.” 
“Sheila”
One shared customer of the Resource Part-
nership and CareerPoint, who had previously 
been determined ineligible for services by 
the State Vocational Rehabilitation agency 
came to the Career Center seeking job skills 
training, information about how work would 
affect her Social Security beneﬁts,  assistance 
with purchasing a car, writing a resume, in-
terviewing, and conducting a job search. This 
individual ﬁrst met with the Resource Partner-
ship Beneﬁts Specialist located at the One-
Stop Career Center and was given the ben-
eﬁts information she needed. As a result, she 
decided she wanted to pursue employment. 
The Beneﬁts Specialist assisted her with writ-
ing a Plan for Achieving Self Support (PASS) to 
ﬁnance a car and referred her to the One-Stop 
WIA counselor to obtain job skills training. 
While she was involved with her chosen train-
ing program, she also received services from 
the One-Stop on interviews, resume writing, 
and conducting a job search.  A few months 
later she had completed training, purchased 
One Stop Center: Resource Partnership (MA)


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Promising Practices: BPA&O Collaboration with One-Stop Centers, Part I. Co-location of One Stop and BPA&O Services: Resource Partnership (Massachusetts)

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