One DSD Team
Colleagues working together to make equity part of everyday decisions, programs, and services.
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The Disability Services Division reference program
One DSD shows how the shared People, Access and Culture foundation can become a complete, practical program within a division. It adds DSD situations, services, relationships, and learning while remaining connected to One DHS.
Optional view
Switch to the One DSD view to keep the shared One DHS foundation while adding Disability Services Division examples and routes. This choice does not confirm consultation eligibility or open a protected space.
Choose what would help
Build from a welcoming introduction through intercultural practice, structural analysis, and systems change without being scored.
Explore learningUse questions, checklists, reviews, and working tools to shape a program, policy, service, meeting, or workforce decision.
Open PracticeUse reviewed, question-led material to plan access and engagement without treating group information as a label for a person.
Explore Minnesota CommunitiesWork independently when that is enough, or identify the person or office responsible for the decision.
Review support choicesColleagues working together to make equity part of everyday decisions, programs, and services.
Connect with colleagues, explore something new, or bring an idea that could make everyday work better. Find what interests you and take part in a way that fits.
The shared foundation
The DSD layer
Start with a question from your work, or browse the full program list.
Sets policy for waiver and community-based services, including eligibility, service menus, rates, and provider standards.
Governs how people are assessed for and connected to long-term services and supports.
Standards and support for the people who plan services with individuals and families.
Guidance and oversight for positive support strategies and person-centered planning.
Work toward services in the most integrated setting appropriate to the person.
Employment-first practice and day service policy.
Services for children with autism and related conditions and their families.
Programs for people with brain injury and work related to guardianship and supported decision-making.
Contracting, grants, rates, and capacity building for the division's providers and partners.
Division data, quality assurance, and evaluation of services and outcomes.
Division learning, internal and external communication, and plain-language practice.
Division direction, legislative coordination, and the DSD equity implementation plan.
A DSD unit has filled three positions in a year. Each time, the panel chose the candidate who interviewed most fluently and had a graduate degree. Two strong internal candidates with years of direct-support and community experience did not advance past screening.
In a stay conversation, a team member says they have never been told what the next classification requires, that visible projects go to the same two people, and that they are considering leaving.
A DSD staff member with an established accommodation is selected for an acting lead assignment in another unit. The new unit does not know about the arrangement, the cohort kickoff uses timed small-group activities with no captions, and the person quietly withdraws from the rotation.
A change to documentation requirements for a waiver service is scheduled for leadership approval in four weeks. The change was designed to reduce fraud risk. No one has yet asked which families will find the new requirement hardest to meet.
A DSD team is redesigning how people are assessed for services. Early drafts add a self-service online step that would save staff time. Some of the people assessed do not use English, do not have reliable internet, or need supported decision-making.
A program change has been approved and funded. A manager asks for listening sessions with affected communities before rollout. Two of those communities were asked similar questions last year by another DHS unit and never heard what happened.
A DSD team completed listening sessions with families and providers. The notes are rich. The team is unsure what to send back and worries about promising things it cannot deliver.
A provider reports that a DSD form required for authorization cannot be completed with a screen reader and is only available as a scanned image. No one on the team knows who owns the form.
Families calling a DSD intake line reach an English-only greeting and a voicemail. Interpretation is available once a staff member calls back, often days later.
A DSD supervisor notices that the same three people speak in meetings while newer staff and staff from other backgrounds stay quiet. One person told the supervisor privately that speaking up once got them nowhere.
During a planning meeting, a comment about a community's habits went unchallenged. Afterward, two staff members said they felt the room had endorsed it. The person who made the comment did not realize it caused harm.
Several DSD teams have equity improvements ready, each waiting on the same approval step. The step exists because of a past problem no one can describe. Staff have begun to treat the process as immovable.
A DSD analyst is asked to report service outcomes by race and language for a rural county. In several groups the count is below ten. Leadership wants the numbers next week.
Complete scope
The DSD reference program applies the shared framework across the full organization, not only training or workplace culture. Each area can receive DSD examples and practice material after review.
Explore areas of workA defined service boundary
Staff across DHS can use the shared learning, tools, and library. Staff consultation request forms are closed. For DSD work that needs another perspective or a decision, start with the responsible supervisor, Equity Director or Specialist, policy owner, or other office.
Work outside DSD is routed to the responsible supervisor, Equity Director or Specialist, policy or program owner, or other department office.