Gov. Wes Moore proposes slashing hundreds of millions of dollars in planned spending to close Maryland’s $3 billion budget gap, including a small program that provides modest grants to families caring for a loved one with developmental disabilities.

At $5 million per year, the program is among the smallest of the cuts, but participants say has an outsized benefit to their families’ lives.

“This is exactly the wrong place for the state to be looking to cut money,” said Gregory T. Miller, CEO of Penn-Mar Human Services, a nonprofit that helps run the program for the state.

Known as Low Intensity Support Services, or LISS, the program offers grants of up to $2,000 to pay for one-time or short-term needs for a person with developmental or intellectual disabilities. Recipients must not be receiving any other state-funded medical services. Some are on a waitlist for services; others have private insurance.

Families have used the grant money to pay for things that insurance doesn’t cover: special summer camps, ramps, medical supplies, assistive technology, supplemental caregivers to give families a break.

Demand for the program is so great that the grants to about 2,500 individuals each year are awarded through a lottery.

Krysten Wilkes was shocked when she learned that LISS was on the budget chopping block. Wilkes has an 8-year-old son, M.J., who has a rare neurogenetic condition. He’s nonverbal and uses a wheelchair.

“He has a lot of challenges,” Wilkes said. “He relies on adult support or help for all things: Feeding, dressing, all things self-care. Obviously, that’s a huge challenge.”

Though the Wilkes family has good health insurance — her husband is retired from the Air Force — that insurance doesn’t cover everything that M.J. needs.

A LISS grant allowed the Wilkes family to stock up on medical diapers, install a ramp at their Havre de Grace home, buy adaptive eating utensils and buy an iPad with an app that M.J. uses to communicate. The app alone cost $300.

“That’s been life-changing for us,” Wilkes said. “He can tell us when he wants to eat, when he needs a diaper change. That’s his only way to communicate with us.”

Wilkes is a certified behavior analyst and works with children with special needs, mainly with autism spectrum disorder. She recommends LISS to all her clients and is worried that the lifeline might be gone.

“When I learned they were trying to cut the program, I was really upset about it,” she said. “I voted for Wes Moore. I’m not a very political person, but I voted for him. … This situation is really frustrating for me as a voter.”

Dr. Bergina Isbell, a psychiatrist and mother of three in Ellicott City, used LISS to help her now-15-year-old son, who is on the “autism rainbow.” The first time she applied, her son was not selected for a grant. The second time, she was able to buy an iPad with assisted communication technology.

Isbell’s son had stopped speaking, and using the technology had the surprising result of spurring him to start speaking again, Isbell said, a welcome outcome.

“The return on investment is huge because it was able to stimulate his ability to speak,” she said.

While some see LISS as helping families only in the short term, Isbell said she was able to upgrade the iPad multiple times over the years.

“He was able to use that one LISS device for six or seven years,” Isbell said.

For many families, LISS is a “lifeline,” said André Burno Coates, executive director of Maryland Community Connection, another nonprofit that administers the program for the state. Many of them are on a waiting list for more significant funding from the state Developmental Disabilities Administration.

“Our LISS families, they make do,” Coates said. “Sometimes just a little is enough to get them over the hump.”

Coates suspects that LISS is on the chopping block because, unlike other DDA programs, there are no matching funds from the federal government.

Miller, from Penn-Mar Human Services, said LISS provides a powerful bang for its buck, helping families with significant needs and few resources.

“The cut in this program is going to create a significant hardship for families,” he said.

In a statement, Moore spokesman Carter Elliott IV said the state is facing a “difficult truth” that the growth in spending for the Developmental Disabilities Administration is unsustainable.

“In balancing the budget, the Moore-Miller Administration has sought to focus spending on the core services of DDA,” Elliott said. He added that the administration will work with lawmakers and advocates “to restrain budget growth in ways that ensure that Marylanders with disabilities are able to continue receiving the core, essential services that they need.”

The elimination of LISS is among hundreds of millions of dollars proposed to be cut from programs for people with developmental disabilities this budget year and next. It’s tucked into a 132-page budget reconciliation bill, a few lines that wipe the LISS program out of state law permanently.

Moore and top lawmakers announced last week that they found a way to cover full funding for the Developmental Disabilities Administration for the current budget year — effectively forestalling the planned cuts — but funding cuts are still scheduled for the next budget year beginning July 1.

The cuts to LISS and other DDA programs have sent individuals with disabilities, their caregivers and advocates on a mission to claw back as much funding as possible.

They’ve rallied outside the State House, spent a full day lobbying their lawmakers and sent countless emails. They acknowledge that the state is in tough financial times and that the Developmental Disabilities Administration budget has grown in recent years. But they say the state shouldn’t balance its budget by targeting services for some of the most vulnerable Marylanders.

The nonprofit organization Melwood, which provides services for people with disabilities, would be hit hard by a proposal to eliminate a bump in pay for workers living in high-cost areas.

Already, Melwood has a gap between state funding and actual pay for workers of $400,000 per year. That would grow to $1.4 million if Moore’s cuts go through, said Larysa Kautz, Melwood’s president and CEO.

“We have the capability to supplement for a while, but it’s not sustainable,” Kautz said.

Kautz said she fears smaller providers might go under in the face of state budget cuts.

“That’s a catastrophe,” she said.