Kenneth Bence

speaker

245 appearances 1 recordings 1 series first heard Jun 2026 last heard 19 Jun

Kenneth Bence’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 1 in all, peaking in Jun 2026 with 1.

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Health Chatter · Disabilities Research & Policy with Kenneth Bence · 19 Jun 2026 podcast

for whatever reason, the focus has been in the human services sector for the last few sessions.

And a large part of that then affects people with disabilities.

And so even in the recently completed 2026 session, we saw a number of provisions go through that put caps or limits on the types of services or number of units of services that a person can receive.

Because the state wanted to pay for fewer units of service, if you will.

So it was a budgetary thing.

But that has direct impact on a person's life and the kinds of things that they can do.

They still have the disability.

It doesn't change.

So, you know, it was despite lots of advocacy by ARM, by the provider organizations that we represent, by individual advocates and people with disabilities themselves, you know, really making some very emotional pleas in legislative committees and through testimony and so forth.

But at the end of the day, it becomes financial decisions and budget decisions, and that's what it comes down to.

And we really had been...

disappointed again that the focus then and focused on human services.

And as I said at the beginning, you know, because it's, as we go through the legislative process, it becomes political and, you know, there really weren't strong party lines and kind of where support was, but in such a closely divided legislature, like we have in Minnesota, getting things passed,

took a lot of effort and so we ended up where we ended up.

But because this has been a chronically underfunded sector, as I've said, and we continue to sort of ratchet it down when there are budgets

issue, you know, trying to figure, trying to balance a budget, it makes the system much more strained.

I think it makes life more difficult for those who have disabilities.

And that's, we always refer to them as the most vulnerable in our society.

And why are we making their lives harder rather than easier?

Well, it's a very good topic to bring up.

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