If you are a parent of a child with support needs in British Columbia, the ground just shifted beneath your feet.

For years, we have known the Ministry of Children and Family Development (MCFD) was looking to overhaul the Children and Youth with Support Needs (CYSN) framework. On February 10, 2026, they finally dropped the details.

I am reading through the hundreds of pages of guides, transcripts, and policy documents so you don’t have to. And speaking to you not just as a BCBA, but as a parent who knows how expensive and exhausting raising kids in this province is, my reaction is complicated.

This is a massive structural change. Some families are popping champagne today, while others are rightfully panicking about the future.

Here is the brutal truth about the new model, the wins, the losses, and the skepticism we need to hold onto.

For decades, British Columbia’s system was inequitable. If your child had an Autism diagnosis, you received direct funding ($22,000 under age 6; $6,000 for ages 6-18). If your child had Down syndrome, Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD), or a severe intellectual disability without an Autism label, you largely got… nothing.

That ends now.

Under the new BC Children and Youth Disability Benefit, children with diagnoses like Down syndrome, Angelman syndrome, and severe intellectual disabilities will finally be "direct admits." They will receive between $6,500 and $17,000 per year, regardless of income.

This is a win. It creates equity for thousands of families who have been shouting into the void for years. If you fall into this category, this is the recognition and support you have deserved since day one.

However, equity often comes with a cost, and in this case, the cost is being paid by families who don't fit the "highest needs" criteria.

The government has introduced a new Disability Supplement (income-tested) alongside the Benefit. But here is the kicker: If your child has "Level 1" Autism or ADHD and you are a middle-class family, you are likely losing your direct funding.

The Ministry’s own guide uses a persona named "Ollie." Ollie has Autism and ADHD but no intellectual disability. His parents earn $120,000 a year. In the old system, Ollie got $6,000 a year until he turned 19. In the new system, because of his parents' income, he gets $3,200. If his parents earned more, he would get less.

For many families in BC, $120,000 is not "rich", it is barely surviving rent and groceries. Stripping funding from these families because they don’t meet a poverty threshold or a severity threshold is going to hurt. It removes the agency of parents to hire their own teams and forces them to rely on the "public system."

This brings me to my biggest skepticism as a behaviour analyst and self-employed service provider in BC.

The government promises a massive expansion of "free, community-based services" (speech, OT, behaviour support) to fill the gaps for the kids losing funding. They are putting millions into Child Development Centres (CDCs) and hubs.

But here is the reality on the ground: A promise of service is not the same as a service.

We are currently in a staffing crisis. Waitlists for CDCs in some areas are already years long. Shifting thousands of children from private, direct-funded teams onto the public waitlists is a logistical nightmare.

The Ministry says they will hire more staff, use therapy assistants, and expand reach. But until those professionals are actually hired and seeing kids, I worry that "expanded community services" will just mean "expanded waitlists."

Another major shift is the reliance on the Federal Disability Tax Credit (DTC).

To get the new income-tested Supplement, you must have the DTC. The problem? The DTC is notoriously difficult to get for children with behavioural diagnoses (like ADHD or Level 1 Autism) who are cognitively "capable."

By tying provincial funding to a federal tax credit adjudicated by the CRA, we are adding a layer of bureaucracy that will inevitably leave some families behind, specifically those who don't have the time, language skills, or money to fight the CRA.

If you are feeling anxious, you are right to feel that way. Change is an antecedent for anxiety.

Here is my advice:

This is a monumental shift. It rights some historical wrongs, but it creates new cracks for families to fall through.

We’re going to navigate this together. The ministry has published a Guide for Current Service Recipients you can read here.

I’ll do my best to digest and communicate new information as it comes out.