Housing benefit extended to people leaving sheltered housing

A person with a disability who moves out of sheltered housing and into a home of their own no longer loses financial support merely because they did not come straight from a residential centre. Law no. 146/2026, published in Official Gazette of Romania no. 588 of 20 July 2026, approves Government Emergency Ordinance no. 90/2025 with amendments and closes exactly that gap. The law completes the framework for which the Government had already set out the procedure for granting the housing benefit and the transition benefit.

The ordinance now approved, published on the last day of 2025, rewrote a substantial part of Law no. 448/2006 on the protection and promotion of the rights of persons with disabilities. It introduced the housing benefit, a monthly allowance worth one gross national minimum wage, and the transition benefit, worth up to two minimum wages, for people who leave public residential centres and move to life in the community.

The same ordinance renamed the social services intended to support independent living and changed the free interurban transport scheme, turning it into a choice between free journeys and vouchers for fuel or electricity worth up to 1,500 lei a year for severe disability and 750 lei a year for marked disability.

On 28 August the procedure was repealed and rewritten as an annex to Law no. 7/2023, and the 30 June 2026 deadline was deleted.

What it changes in practice

The first effect is the extension of the housing benefit. The law adds a new paragraph to Article 20² of Law no. 448/2006: people assessed as having a severe, marked or moderate disability who leave supported community living services in order to live independently may receive the benefit, on the basis of an individual needs assessment carried out by the complex assessment services for adults with disabilities.

The difference from the wording of the ordinance matters. The December 2025 text granted the benefit to people leaving public residential centres, but expressly excluded protection measures of the supported community living type. In other words, someone who had already passed through sheltered housing had no access to support at the next step, the one towards fully independent living. The law closes that break in the chain.

The second effect concerns money and naming. Three new paragraphs are inserted into Article 51 of the same law, tying the old service codes to the new names. The cost standard for the centre for independent living, previously coded 8790 CR-D-IV, becomes the cost standard for the supported community living service of the independent living centre type. The standard for maximum sheltered housing, previously coded 8790 CR-D-VII, becomes the standard for sheltered housing, while the standard for the minimally sheltered housing service is repealed. These standards are to be updated by Government decision.

The third effect concerns the assessment boards. For the assessment board for adults with disabilities, the law rewrites the conditions in Article 85(4). The chair and deputy chair must be senior consultants or specialists in the medical assessment of work capacity, family or general medicine, internal medicine or physical and rehabilitation medicine, holding a licence to practise. The third medical member, nominated by the county public health directorate, may come from a far wider list that includes psychiatry, ophthalmology, neurology, oncology, surgery, nephrology, pulmonology and endocrinology.

The fourth effect is the composition of the higher board, under Article 90¹. It comprises two doctors specialising in the assessment of work capacity or in physical and rehabilitation medicine, two senior consultants or specialists from the extended list, two social work graduates and two psychology graduates, all with experience in the protection of persons with disabilities.

The fifth effect reaches Social Assistance Law no. 292/2011. The classification of social services is amended: services with accommodation, of the residential and support-with-accommodation type, and services without accommodation, of the community support and supported community living type, in line with the Nomenclature of Social Services approved by Government Decision no. 268/2026. The list of social assistance institutions and the list of services for people with disabilities are updated as well.

The sixth effect is a firm deadline for the Government. Within 30 days of the law entering into force, that is by 22 August 2026, the executive must approve by decision, on a proposal from the Ministry of Labour, Family, Youth and Social Solidarity, the amendment of Government Decision no. 426/2020 on cost standards for social services and of Government Decision no. 268/2026.

What has changed compared with the previous situation

The first change concerns access to the benefit. Previously, the right was tied strictly to leaving a public residential centre, and supported community living was expressly excluded. Now, leaving a supported living service is itself a ground for the benefit, subject to the same individual assessment.

The second change is a matter of legislative technique, but with immediate practical effects: without a correspondence between the old codes and the new names, the general directorates for social assistance could not have applied the cost standards to the renamed services. The law settles that, and one category disappears, minimally sheltered housing, whose standard is repealed.

The third change concerns who assesses you. Under the previous wording, the specialty requirements for board members were narrower. Widening the list of specialties, especially for the member nominated by the public health directorate, gives boards in counties short of work capacity assessment doctors a real chance of being set up.

The fourth change is structural. The Social Assistance Law no longer divides services along the old logic, but along that of the 2026 Nomenclature, with the emphasis on supported community living. This is the legislative step that accompanies the deinstitutionalisation process.

What does not change are the amounts. The housing benefit remains one gross national minimum wage a month, and the transition benefit remains capped at two minimum wages. The law does not touch the ceilings for fuel vouchers either.

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