Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Human rights Human Development Center on trial
Posted by Max Brantley on Wed, Sep 8, 2010 at 11:39 AM
Opening arguments were today in the Justice Department lawsuit over the Conway Human Development Cente. Stephens Media is providing coverage. The arguments are long-standing. The state and families of residents generally defend care there. The Justice Department thinks the institution has many shortcomings and wants to integrate more residents into communities.
Comments (10)
Showing 1-10 of 10
Somehow, via this Justice Department action, I'm having visions of Reagan and his disasterous order to empty mental institutions of people who 'didn't deserve to be there.'
Homelessness soared.
Will 'integrating more residents into the community' be a replay of Reagan's era and a legacy that will live on in infamy?
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The Justice Department wants to integrate more residents into communities, and the U.S Department of Labor wants the community programs to pay employees for the time they spend sleeping in-residence, which will devastate their budgets and require service cutbacks.
The end result of the feds simultaneously attacking both the HDCs and the community-based programs will be a disaster for the people who need these vital services. Our U.S. Attorney, Jane Duke, is effectively cutting down the safety net for persons with disabilities with her ill-advised lawsuit.
I cannot think of any other human condition that is treated with such extreme isolation and segregation as the intellectually handicapped are in these type of facilities. I strongly speculate it has as much or more to do with their physical appearance as their mental limits. eLwood, what if it were a Colony of 500 amputees? Or COPD patients? Or everyone over the age of 70? Don't they seem to integrate into the community just fine with a little orthopedic or respiratory or home health assistance? The issue is to have services available in the real world, for the benefit of the client. I think it is easy for the public (read: no family members affected) to confuse mental illness with mental retardation (to use the old terminology). These are autistic, seizure disordered, cerebral palsied and/or mentally challenged humans. Why must they be hidden away?
To "Radical Centrist": You are way OFF the target Always important to deal in facts before we resort to name calling. Jane Duke has nothing to do with the lawsuit against the state Human Development Centers. It is being pursued directly out of "Main Justice" in Washington, DC. See http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2010/May/10-… . If there ARE problems with the lawsuit, it would undoubtedly be better IF it were in the hands of Jane Duke. But her office doesn't even send a representative to the trial. There is no connection. Check your facts, Radical Centrist.
"Motherknowsbest" clearly knows not what she is talking about. Just for starters--clients at the HDCs are not "hidden away" from the public. Staff at these facilities accompany the clients into the community--to shop, to restaurants, to just about every place in the community that they might want to go. This isn't 1858, and CHDC isn't some sort of torture center out of the movies. Here's a thought--maybe you should learn a little something about what you're mouthing off about before you start your blabbering.
arch--you have wrongly attacked me before on this and I don't have any interest in retreading the past. I don't speak on matters of which I know nothing, a good lesson MY mother taught me. Perhaps you should learn a little something about me before you get so defensive. You might be quite surprised at what I know and how I learned it.
Love, Mom
Mother, I have some experience in this area, too--enough to know that you have no idea what you're talking about.
I saw this happen in 1971 at a large residential facility in upstate New York (Sampson State School). It was fallout from Geraldo Rivera's Willowbrook expose. Much like the reaction here, people thought the sky was falling.
The institution was closed and residents were moved into community homes. Members of my family worked at the large institutions and later in the community homes. Bottom line -- the community homes were much better.
Oh, one consequence that people on this blog would appreciate. The governor of New York at the time was a Republican by the name of Nelson Rockefeller. (I had the pleasure of shaking hands with him once.) The closing of the "school" led to a mass convoy of voters to the Board of Elections office to change their party affiliation to Democrat.
Cimarron - Thanks for your response. The USDOJ website claims that she is responsible for "virtually all litigation" in our district, so I doubt that she is as uninvolved as you claim. And I highly doubt that this litigation would be happening if Bud Cummins or Michael Barnes was our U.S. Attorney. I would gladly change my mind if Duke spoke out against the litigation, but so far, she is going along with it. If the DOJ gets its way, many of the residents will be forced to return to horrific, abusive conditions. The quality of the services they receive will decline dramatically, and some of them will end up in criminal justice system, with no regard for their disabilities.
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