From the [Hampton Roads, VA] Daily Press:

Almost 5,000 Virginians with intellectual disabilities are on a waiting list to get community-based housing. Of those, more than 2,500 are listed as in urgent need. Another 17,000 are living at home with elderly parents, which qualifies them to be placed on the state’s urgent needs list as well.

For the fiscal year that starts July 1, the state will be able to provide services to only 400 of those people. At that rate, experts say, the list will keep getting longer, leaving people with intellectual disabilities with two just choices: stay with their aging parents or go to a state institution.

“It really is a desperate situation,” said Jamie Trosclair, executive director of the Arc of Virginia, an advocate for community-based living.

See also: An institution could be the best choice — [Hampton Roads] Daily Press

… While much of the recent focus has been on moving mentally retarded adults out of state care and into smaller, community-based group homes, some parents say that isn’t the right choice for all children.

From the Chicago Tribune:

For students with disabilities, the prom and graduation at the Blue Cap Instructional Center in Blue Island are bittersweet events.

Once they turn 22, these students will no longer be eligible for public education, and will find few adult services available. Many will end up staying at home all day, and will likely lose the educational gains they worked so hard to achieve.

“Thinking about it puts a cold chill up my spine,” says Carl Wanzung, whose daughter Vianey will age out of the Blue Cap program in a few months. She’s been on a waiting list for adult programming for more than two years. If she doesn’t get in, her parents must decide between hiring a day-time aide on their own or one of them quitting work to care for her.

From the Houston Chronicle:

Legislative budget negotiators in Texas have agreed to a $507 million cash infusion that would provide services to about 8,000 people with intellectual disabilities, including some residents in state institutions and others on waiting lists for community living support.

A Houston-area lawmaker said the appropriation for the next two years would be the biggest money boost ever to reduce a wait that can be as long as nine years for people who want to live in community group homes or at home with assistance.

Meanwhile, the Texas House gave initial approval to a measure – similar to a bill that already passed the Senate – aimed at addressing widespread abuse and neglect at the state’s large residential institutions. Among its provisions:

• New protections in institutions, such as video surveillance;
• Renaming “state schools” as “state-supported living centers;”
• Enhanced criminal background checks, random drug testing, and training for employees; and
• Expansion of the role of the inspector general for health and human services.

Earlier posts here.

From the Wichita Eagle:

Several hundred Kansans with developmental disabilities and their supporters rallied in Topeka this week, calling on the state to reduce a waiting list for services that stretches to almost 4,000 names. They say the services are needed to help people with disabilities stay out of institutions and lead more productive lives.

Advocates visited legislators,  brought telephone directory-sized books with synopses of the individuals on the waiting list for services, and drew footprints on butcher paper in a symbolic protest representing each person on the waiting list.

Service providers say it takes about three to four years for a person to make it off the waiting list and into a program. That’s too long, said Robyn Herzog, a developmentally disabled woman from Lawrence who addressed the rally.

“Most people do not even like to wait in line at the movies,” she said. “This is life we’re talking about!”

See also:

Op-ed: Kansas not meeting needs of the disabled - Wichita Eagle

State’s budget slashes $4 million for worker program - [NJ] Courier-Post

Appeals court rules state can trim funding for disabled - Capitol Media Services/Arizona Daily Star

From the Salt Lake Tribune:

The Division of Services for People with Disabilities in Utah is scrambling to resolve a nearly $1 million budget cut by proposing to eliminate staff positions and freeze the waiting list for services indefinitely. There are currently about 1,700 people on the waiting list.

The plan is to shrink programs and reduce the number of disabilities division offices from 24 to between eight and 10 statewide.

“These are the most vulnerable citizens in Utah,” said Claire Mantonya, executive director of the Utah Developmental Disabilities Council. “We’re balancing the budget on their backs?”

… Money is so scarce that people who die or move out of state will not open up slots on the waiting list. Only court-ordered cases and emergency situations will allow new people to start receiving services.

Declines to support full funding for IDEA

Kareem Dale, White House special assistant for disability policy, yesterday sought to deflect widespread criticism of the president’s joke linking his poor bowling score to the Special Olympics. Dale asked the disability community to be patient with the administration without offering specifics about future plans.

“Obviously there was no intent in the comments, no intent or ill will by President Obama,” Dale said in an interview with Disabilityscoop.com.

“When you look at the comments, they were off-handed comments. The president certainly was sorry about it; he immediately apologized. But when you look at his overall record for people with disabilities in this administration and things he’s already done in terms of appointing three people in the White House, in terms of the SCHIP legislation signing, stem cell research, what he’s already done, I think his record speaks for itself and I think that’s the message that folks should take away from it.”

Later in the interview, Dale declined to reiterate the president’s earlier commitment to full funding for the IDEA. “I think that once the budget comes out and we will certainly be looking at all of the options related to funding,” he said.

He said the president is working to include people with disabilities in the administration, but declined to provide specifics about what the administration will do to end Medicaid waiting lists or address the massive underemployment of people with disabilities. An excerpt:

“It’s always hard to accomplish every single solitary thing by the letter that you say you’re going to accomplish. But I think in the first two months we’ve accomplished an extraordinary amount and we’re continuing to work hard. So I would just encourage the disability community, as hard as it is sometimes, to be patient with us and recognize the great accomplishments of the first two months and just look forward to other things to come down the road.”

See earlier post: Arc to Obama: We want change, not just an apology

(Photo from PR Newswire)

Peter V. Berns, executive director of the The Arc of the United States, is calling on President Obama to use the controversy around his Special Olympics remark as an opportunity to advance public understanding and acceptance of people with intellectual disabilities. The comments come in a letter to the president posted on the organization’s website.

People with intellectual and developmental disabilities “understand that public attitudes, misinformation and negative stereotypes are the biggest obstacle to their inclusion in the community,” Berns said. “Join us in breaking down the attitudinal barriers that stand in the way of full inclusion.”

Berns called on Obama to convene a White House meeting to address the following:

• The 700,000 individuals and their families on waiting lists for home and community based services;
• Recent reports of abuse and neglect of people with intellectual disabilities in Iowa and Texas;
• The institutional bias of the Medicaid system and the lack of adequate funding for community care; and
• The need to address long term care and support.

(File photo from [UK] Guardian)