By Hank Russell
Members of the Republican Assembly Minority, as well as local advocates from Long Island and service providers in the early intervention field, recently held a press conference on the Million Dollar Staircase in Albany to shed light on the significant issues plaguing the new Early Intervention Hub (EI-Hub).
This data system, which is designed to manage the Early Intervention Program (EIP) for infants and toddlers with developmental delays or disabilities, has been plagued by technical issues. Those at the press conference voiced their concern on the impact such issues have had on children, families and service providers statewide.
Brown and other Republican assemblymembers are also calling on the Department of Health
PCG, based in Boston, Massachusetts, provides public sector solutions implementation and operations improvement firm that partners with health, education, and human services agencies, according to its website. In 2019, the New York State Department of Health signed a $54 million contract with PCG for its services.
However, citing the extensive issues and technological failures present in the database that have caused service interruptions for children and payment delays for providers, there have been calls for the state Department of Health to fully investigate New York State’s decision to award a contract to Public Consulting Group (PCG) to build the EI-Hub,
“The issues present in the EI-Hub must be addressed and fixed immediately to prevent any further delays in both care for young children with disabilities and payment for providers,” said Assemblyman Keith Brown (R.C-Northport). “So many families statewide rely on this system to help bring their children the therapies, medical care and support they require, and PCG’s version of this system is failing New Yorkers.”
Brown is not the only one who expressed concern about PCG’s failures. In November, Suffolk County Executive Ed Romaine sent a letter — obtained by Long Island Life & Politics — to Governor Kathy Hochul describing the problems parents and providers are facing.
“The system has proven to be highly problematic, and our county has seen first-hand the negative consequences of these issues,” Romaine wrote. “Our staff is working tirelessly, expending significant time and effort to process referrals, however, the system is woefully inefficient.” He said that it now takes 45 minutes to process a referral, as opposed to seven.
Romaine cited a report from the Alliance for the Betterment of Citizens with Disabilities that found similar failures in New Jersey between 2018 and 2019. Rather than try to fix the problem, the report said, the company blamed the providers and the local municipalities, saying they did not know how to use the software.
The New York State agreement with PCG “has clearly not yielded the desired results,” Romaine said.
In response to these criticisms, Hochul spokesperson Gordon Tepper countered Romaine and Brown’s comments, saying updates and improvements to the EI Hub system, with consistent increases in the number of claims being processed as a result of the new system. Further, from October 15, 2024 — when the EI Hub was launched — to January 15, 2025, the Health Department has disbursed 94% of the funds that were released during the same period in 2023.
As to how PCG obtained the contract, Tepper said the Health Department put out a Request for Proposal (RFP) for a competitive procurement of a contractor to provide services to the Early Intervention Program as the integrated case management, provider management, and fiscal management entity.
PCG was the sole vendor to submit a proposal in response to the RFP and was determined to be qualified based on the procurement’s evaluation criteria and their proposed ability to meet the State’s objectives and requirements, according to Tepper. The Department completed the Vendor Responsibility Process required for all contracts in New York State.
The contract awarded to PCG requires that the company complete the work before they can be reimbursed. The contract supports three key areas: State Fiscal Agent activities of managing claim processing, the call center, and the integrated case management and provider management services, which is the EI-Hub.
“New York State’s first priority is to ensure that the 70,000 children served by the early intervention program continue to receive the health care and resources they need. Since its launch on October 15, technical issues with the EI-Hub have been addressed and providers are being reimbursed in a timely manner,” Tepper said. “The [Health] Department will continue to work with our vendor to offer provider training and make further improvements to increase efficiency of the system.”
LILP reached out to PCG for a comment, but has not heard back as of press time.
“We must call on the Department of Health to investigate why these issues are happening and identify what can be done to fix them,” Brown said.