New Mexico · Mi Via and the DD Waiver
The waiver should be the help, not the hard part
Mi Via means "my path." Tu-Via means "your path." This site explains how New Mexico's two developmental disability waivers actually work: what the words mean, what happens in what order, and where you get to decide. Written for parents and guardians, not for agencies.
Start here Mi Via or DD Waiver?
Free to read. Nothing to sign up for. Written for parents and guardians, not for agencies.
Where are you right now?
Pick whichever line sounds most like your week.
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Just heard the word "waiver"
Start at the beginning
What a waiver is, who qualifies, and the one form that starts the clock.
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Applied and waiting
What happens while you wait
Why the wait is measured in years, what your application date protects, and what you can use in the meantime.
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Got an allocation letter
Mi Via or the DD Waiver?
The one real choice you get to make, laid out side by side.
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Already in services
Decode the paperwork
ISP, SSP, IBA, AAB, EOR, LOC, TPA, FMA. Every acronym in one searchable list.
Why this site exists
I am a parent here in New Mexico, working through these same programs for my own child. Nobody hands you a map. You get a diagnosis, then eventually a letter, then a stack of forms written for the people who process them.
The information is public. It is on the Health Care Authority's website, in service standards hundreds of pages long, and in memos numbered by year. It is accurate and it is nearly unreadable at 11pm after a hard day.
So this site does one narrow thing: it says the same things in the order a parent runs into them, in words a parent uses. Where I simplify, I link to the official page, so you can check me and so you have the document to point at when someone tells you no.
I am not a case manager, a consultant, or a lawyer, and I get things wrong. Tell me when I do.
Two waivers, one set of services
Both are Medicaid Home and Community-Based Services waivers run by the Developmental Disabilities Supports Division (DDSD). You apply once, for both. The difference is who runs the day-to-day.
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You run it
Mi Via, the self-directed waiver
You get a budget and you hire, schedule, and direct the people who help. A consultant guides you; a financial agency does payroll. More control, more admin.
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Agencies run it
The DD Waiver, "traditional"
A case manager coordinates, and contracted provider agencies deliver the services. Less paperwork on you, less say over exactly who shows up.
This is not a government website and I am not your case manager. I cannot look up your registry date, change a budget, or approve a service. What this site can do is help you walk into that meeting knowing what the words mean. For anything official, the Health Care Authority's DDSD pages (opens an outside website) are the source, and your regional DDSD office is who to call.
Something here wrong, missing, or out of date? Please say so. Program rules shift, phone numbers change, and a wrong detail on a page like this costs a family real time.