Montachusetts, Massachusetts

Montachusett Regional Transit Authority (MART) has been brokering Human Service transportation in Massachusetts since 1990 for MassHealth (Medicaid/DMA), as well as Department of Public Health Early Intervention (DPH) programs since 1992 and Department of Mental Retardation (DMR) since 1995. The Human Service Transportation Office (HSTO) was created by the Commonwealth in 2001, resulting in Massachusetts being divided into nine Human Service Transportation Areas. MART has also leveraged and developed advanced technologies in order to advance coordination to the next level in Massachusetts.

MART has worked closely with the Massachusetts HST Office and Executive Office of Transportation (EOT) to develop a fully coordinated Human Service Transportation system. By taking the lead in developing scalable and advanced automated systems, while also developing and promoting collaborative efforts with state agencies, vendors and consumers in the human service system, MART has been able to make significant advances in improving coordination of services. This was accomplished by making a detailed assessment and evaluation of the limitations of the existing transportation system. MART was able to determine specific sectors within the current system that were driving costs, hindering efficiency or reducing quality of service. The driving force behind these efforts was the desire to make the system work more efficiently for the consumer. MART, the HST Office and EOT are trying to ensure everyone has access to the human service transportation system in Massachusetts, by lowering and controlling costs while constantly evaluating and improving service quality. To a great degree, this has been accomplished by (1) trying to combine and adapt various funding streams to support as many consumers as possible within the system (2) emphasizing ride sharing through mapping programs and (3) allowing vendors to continuously update their prices to allow for competitive bidding among all vendors.