Proposed Budget Cuts
Target People with Disabilities
San Diegans Schedule Rally to Fight Back
Article by Nancy Batterman of Community Options in
San Diego
A state plan to divert funds from services that assist people with
developmental disabilities to help pay for a $17 billion budget shortfall in the
coming fiscal year has San Diegans up in arms.
Hundreds of San Diegans will voice their concerns with the proposed budget
cuts and congregate in support of people with developmental disabilities at noon
on Friday, April 12, at The ARC-San Diego offices in Kearny Mesa. The event is
part of a statewide, multi-city Grass Roots Rally and will serve as a preview to
a similar public outcry scheduled for April 17 on the steps of the State Capitol
building in Sacramento.
The 2002-2003 budget proposed by Governor Davis will dock necessary programs
and services for 185,000 Californians who have developmental disabilities, such
as mental retardation, autism, cerebral palsy and epilepsy. The Governor
proposes at least $52 million in cuts in services and supports provided by the
Department of Developmental Services and a $7 million reduction in funding to
the Department of Rehabilitation for the fiscal year beginning July 1, 2002.
These departments fund services such as job training and placement,
transportation, residential assistance, respite and independent living support
for people that live with mental and physical challenges.
Locally, the cuts would drastically affect the lives of more than 13,300 San
Diego residents with developmental disabilities, who receive assistive services
from state-reimbursed community-based nonprofit organizations.
“When the state cuts funding, it’s not cutting money. It’s eliminating a job
for someone with a developmental disability, or deleting a support staff
position that enables six people to live on their own. These are real people,
not some statistics on a balance sheet,” said Carol Fitzgibbons, Executive
Director at Home of Guiding Hands, a local nonprofit agency that provides
residential and vocational services to more than 400 San Diegans with
developmental disabilities.
The proposed budget adds insult to injury to a direct-care system that has
been struggling for over a decade to provide quality services with limited
funding.
According to Marty Omoto, legislative director for the California Coalition
of United Cerebral Palsy Associations, budget cuts in the early 1990s dealt a
debilitating blow to persons with developmental disabilities and those cuts were
never fully restored.
“During good budget times, with surpluses, people with developmental
disabilities and their services and supports in the community were never fully
funded, leaving the system in a continuing state of crisis, that is worsening,”
he maintains.
The programs targeted by the governor for 2002-2003 budget reductions include
supported employment, education, community-based instruction and work activity
programs, residential and independent living programs and assistance for
families.
Ironically, the proposed cuts come on the heels of a Federal initiative
championed by President Bush that urges states and local entities to eliminate
barriers and promote the community integration of people with developmental
disabilities, in support of the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Olmstead v. L.C.
Supreme Court (1999).
As part of this “New Freedom Initiative,” the President signed an Executive
Order last June calling for increased access to technology, expanded educational
opportunities, workforce integration and the full participation of people with
developmental disabilities in community life.
“As it stands now, the 2002-2003 budget is a slap in the face to the
directive issued by President Bush,” Fitzgibbons said.
