Lebanon County MATP: How Community Action Partnership Contracts Its Medicaid Rides (2027)

Lebanon County runs its Medicaid rides from a county office and contracts the driving itself. The county’s Community Action Partnership (CAP) operates the Medical Assistance Transportation Program (MATP) and buys each year’s rides from about 30 carriers: the transit authority, a cab company, two ambulance organizations, and a long list of people contracting under their own names. This page covers who to call, how those agreements work, what the county spends, and how a small ride company gets on the list.

Who runs MATP in Lebanon County

Pennsylvania pays for Medicaid rides through a program in each county, and only Philadelphia uses a broker. The Pennsylvania guide covers the statewide rules, the Public Utility Commission license, and what MATP pays for.

The state’s June 25, 2026 broker study puts Lebanon among seven counties on the hybrid model, where county staff share the program with outside carriers. Here the county side is CAP, a county department the Governor designated a community action agency in 1991. Its MATP staff, full-time MATP officers and an MATP coordinator, are county employees, and the commissioners approve each hire in their meetings.

CAP works from 220 East Lehman Street, Lebanon 17046, and its MATP line, 717-273-9328, is the main CAP number. The DHS county contact list, updated June 18, 2026, shows that line open weekdays from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., with no weekend hours and no separate toll-free number.

How CAP contracts its rides

CAP buys rides through a one-year Agreement for Provision of Medical Transportation with each carrier. The agreements cover curb-to-curb or door-to-door rides that CAP requests for riders enrolled in MATP, and each one ends June 30, the close of the state fiscal year. Every agreement goes to the Board of Commissioners for a vote in a public meeting, sometimes after its start date, so the county’s minutes show the whole carrier list. Until 2025, Lebanon Transit’s agreement went to the board on its own, after the July list.

Fiscal year	Carrier agreements the board approved	MATP money
2023-24	27 on July 20, 2023, Lebanon Transit on August 17, three more on October 5, and one on November 16	$1,362,662 allocation, accepted October 5, 2023
2024-25	27 on July 3, 2024, Lebanon Transit on November 7, and a transport company and one individual on January 16, 2025	$1,407,238 in costs, per the cost report approved October 16, 2025
2025-26	29 on July 17, 2025, Lebanon Transit included, and one individual on October 16, 2025	$1,564,025 initial allocation, accepted October 16, 2025

Three patterns matter if you want in:

• Most carriers are individuals. The July 17, 2025 list names 25 people next to four organizations: Lebanon Transit, Yellow Cab, Central Medical Ambulance Service, and First Aid and Safety Patrol. Most of the names return from one year’s list to the next.
• The list is not closed after July. From June 2023 to October 2025, the board approved 10 agreements outside the July lists. Two were Lebanon Transit’s, and the other eight added seven individuals and a transport company whose agreement ran from January 1, 2025.
• Rates live in each agreement. Ask CAP what it pays and how it wants trips invoiced before you sign. State rules make it one all-inclusive rate per trip, as the Pennsylvania guide explains.

The money comes from the Department of Human Services each year. The allocation grew from $1,362,662 for 2023-24 to $1,564,025 for 2025-26, a rise of about 15%. As of September 2026, the commissioners’ page posts condensed minutes by year from 2020, and the 2025 file ends in October 2025, so ask CAP for the 2026-27 carrier list.

Lebanon Transit’s share of MATP

Lebanon Transit, the County of Lebanon Transit Authority, runs the county’s buses and its shared ride. PennDOT’s report for fiscal year 2024-25 (July 2024 to June 2025) shows MATP is a small part of that shared ride: 3,477 MATP trips out of 38,572, well behind 17,944 senior trips. The shared ride cost an average of $51.14 a trip against an average fare of $21.26, with 11 vehicles in maximum service.

The shared ride is curb-to-curb, every vehicle has a wheelchair lift, and every rider registers first. Its policy handbook, updated May 2026, allows only medical trips under MATP. The handbook and the shared ride page set these limits:

• Where it goes. Trips inside Lebanon County, plus the Hershey Medical Center campus in Dauphin County three times each weekday: arrivals from 9:15 to 9:40 a.m. and from noon to 12:25 p.m., and one return run from 3 to 3:30 p.m. Riders phone customer service for trips outside the county.
• When it runs. Inside Lebanon city, weekdays 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Saturday 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. In the rest of the county, Monday to Saturday 8 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Early morning and evening rides are booked by phone. No Sunday service, and none on six holidays.
• How riders book. By 2 p.m. the business day before, up to two weeks ahead, at 717-274-3514. Unscheduled trips are not accepted.
• Pickups. A 30-minute pickup window, a five-minute driver wait, and cancellations at least one hour before the window opens.

So the shared ride does not run on Sundays or those six holidays, and its published hours end at 5 p.m. in the city and 3:30 p.m. elsewhere. Ask CAP which trips it most needs a carrier for, such as Sunday or holiday trips, late returns, or appointments outside the county.

Lebanon Transit’s full fares, effective July 1, 2026, also give you a local benchmark for your own private-pay rates:

One-way distance	Full fare
Up to 5 miles	$24.00
5 to 10 miles	$28.00
Over 10 miles	$33.00

Seniors 65 and older pay a $3 co-pay set by the Area Agency on Aging, and riders with disabilities aged 18 to 64 pay $3.60 to $4.95. Lebanon Transit moved its main office to 145 Schneider Drive on June 29, 2026 while a new facility goes up at 200 Willow Street, and its main line is still 717-274-3664.

How to get Lebanon County MATP work

1. Get licensed first. Any paid ride that starts and ends in Pennsylvania needs Public Utility Commission authority. The PUC puts its average processing time for a paratransit application at three months, and the Pennsylvania guide walks through it. See also NEMT license requirements.
2. Call CAP at 717-273-9328. Ask for the MATP coordinator and ask what the Agreement for Provision of Medical Transportation requires: insurance limits, vehicle and driver checks, the rate, and the invoice schedule.
3. Offer what the list is short on. Ask which hours, days, and destinations CAP has trouble covering. Lebanon Transit’s Sunday and holiday closures above are a good place to start the conversation.
4. Time it, but do not wait for July. CAP took each new year’s list to the board in July (July 20, 2023, July 3, 2024, and July 17, 2025), and the board has approved new carriers in June, October, November, and January.
5. Follow the board. The commissioners meet the first and third Thursday of each month at 9:30 a.m. in Room 207 of the Municipal Building, 400 South 8th Street, and their office answers at 717-228-4427.

Other ride work in and around Lebanon County

Health plans. The state’s February 13, 2026 covered services list leaves stretcher and ambulance rides out of MATP. DHS’s April 29, 2026 guidance lets MATP offices refer those requests to the rider’s HealthChoices plan when they cannot provide the ride. Lebanon sits in the Lehigh/Capital zone, with five physical health plans: AmeriHealth Caritas Pennsylvania, Geisinger Health Plan, Jefferson Health Plans EverWell, Highmark Wholecare, and UPMC for You. UPMC for You’s manual updated December 31, 2025 tells providers in this zone they need not call UPMC Medical Transportation, the line it uses for ambulance and wheelchair van trips in other zones. See how to contract with Medicaid health plans.

Veterans. The Lebanon VA Medical Center, at 1700 South Lincoln Avenue, draws riders from beyond the county. rabbittransit schedules shared rides to it from York County, and from Dauphin County on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and the VA runs a weekday shuttle from Lebanon to the Philadelphia VA Medical Center. Its Special Mode Transportation office, at 717-272-6621, extension 5767, arranges wheelchair van or ambulance rides when a VA provider finds them clinically justified. See VA transportation contracts.

Seniors. The Lebanon County Area Agency on Aging, at 710 Maple Street (717-273-9262), sets the senior shared-ride co-pay and recruits volunteer drivers to escort people to medical appointments. See Area Agency on Aging contracts.

Neighbors. Each county around Lebanon buys rides its own way. Dauphin County moved MATP to rabbittransit on July 1, 2026. Lancaster and Berks sit under the South Central Transit Authority’s agreement with DHS. Schuylkill County, to the north, is the other hybrid county on Lebanon’s border.