Nonprofit to cut nearly half of staff

A Philadelphia nonprofit serving 3,600 people with disabilities announced Thursday that it was laying off 132 employees because of funding cuts from the state.

Liberty Resources Inc., which serves the Philadelphia region and Allentown, already had stopped accepting new clients because of a $13 million shortfall in its $89 million budget, said Thomas Earle, chief executive.

Most of the employees who lost their jobs were coordinators of services provided to people living independently outside of group facilities, Earle said. The layoffs represent 43 percent of Liberty's workforce.

The reduction in state funding also will affect several thousand home-care workers, Earle said.

The state in January implemented new reimbursement rates that were developed in the final months of the administration of Gov. Ed Rendell for providers such as Liberty Resources. Earle said the rates made it "unsustainable" to add clients.

"There has to be a solution or the system of home community-based services is going to collapse," Earle said.

On Wednesday, an attorney representing the Pennsylvania Council on Independent Living sent a letter to state officials urging "immediate and permanent modifications" to the new state funding policy.

Earle said that independent-living services save the state millions of dollars that would otherwise be used to pay for costly nursing homes.

Contact staff writer Robert Moran at 215-854-5983 or bmoran@phillynews.com.