Reports from the Front in Blunt's War on the Disabled
Yesterday, Matt Blunt's Department of Mental Health announced to the parents and caretakers of disabled individuals at Bellefontaine Habilitation Center that 140 residents would be forced into the care of private care providers and out of the facility they call home. Also announced was that nearly 400 of the employees who care for Bellefontaine residents would be terminated at the beginning of 2008. The Post-Dispatch explained:
The plan, revealed Thursday to Bellefontaine employees and some parents
of residents, did not receive a warm welcome from representatives of
those groups.Betty Coll, vice president of the Bellefontaine Habilitation Center
Parents Association and president of the Mental Retardation Association
of Missouri, called the state's plan incomplete and said it does not
assure residents' safety.
One attendee at the event relayed to Fired Up! a telling vignette from the scene of yesterday's announcement.
When DMH hatchet man Bernie Simons completed his presentation, a habilitation center employee, Rafael Sowler, mentioned to Simons the experiences of other states with moving severely developmentally disabled individuals out of their long-term living situation. Sowler explained that when individuals like the ones at Bellefontaine are moved, the attendant rate of death --due to the drastic change and upheaval introduced into an already delicate life-- is alarmingly high.
Simons' response to the comment was quick and terse:
"We are aware of that."
They know people will die, needlessly, but they will sally forth with the plan anyway.
What a fine, compassionate bunch. Apparently, carrying out Matt Blunt's arbitrary agenda for closure and privatization of Bellefontaine is so critically important that it must be completed even if the lives of dozens of developmentally disabled Missourians are put in immediate and identifiable risk as a result. The Blunt regime, as demonstrated by Simons, is astounding in its monstrosity.
- Login or register to post comments
- Printer-friendly version
This is the best thing that could have happened to our fellow ..
This is the best thing that could have happened to our fellow citizens. No one deserves taxpayer sponsored segregation purely on the basis of disability, especially when we know we can effectively support people in the community.
If the writers of Fired Up had read the federal reports of Bellefontaine, they would know that the residents there are, right now, in immediate and identifiable risk of harm. Should they stay that way, abused, neglected and locked up so some can retain low level jobs in their district?
This is not about jobs, this is about freedom, safety and taxpayer sponsored segregation.... and those workers, if they are good, will find employment in the community supporting people.
Yep. Those silly parents. What do they know?
"The proposed closing of Bellfontaine Hablitation Center in St. Louis, a home for the mentally disabled was also debated.
"What we have here is a death sentence for some of the residents who surely won't make it," said Micky Slawson, president of the Parents Association at Bellefontaine.
Slawson, whose daughter has resides at Bellefontaine, said that residents have more freedom at the facility than they could ever hope to have in the community.
"We're just at you're mercy, and we're begging that this can be changed," said Slawson.
Betty Call, vice president of the Parents Association at Bellefontaine commented on the support for Tsumani disaster victims, pleading for the same support concenrning those with disabilities.
"We would deeply appreciate your support for the most vulnerable in Missouri and save them from disaster," she said."
-----------------
Or the petition. Please take special note of the bold type words.
"one of those proposed was bellfontaine habilitation center in st.
louis...a home for the mentally disabled...also on his target list was
the first steps program designed to assist children with special
needs....the latest target on governor blunts list is missouri's state
schools for "severely handicapped" children...there are 35 schools
statewide that serve over 1,000 children between the ages of 5 and 21
who because of their severe mental and physical disabilities and
compromised immune systems can not function in the public school
setting which is what he is proposing"
"everything from specialized equipment...trained cpr certified
staff...and all therapies are housed in the building...it is a
contained environment which does cut down on exposure to viruses and
bacteria which can be deadly for some of these children"
------------------
It's a good thing we have Governor Blunt and the republican legislature to set those ignorant parents straight, isn't it.
You know, most parents love their kids and would never try to have them put through the detailed and lengthy steps of the process to place their children somewhere like Bellefontaine unless they thought it absolutely necessary. You appear to be assuming that everyone can live free and possibly independent and that the people who live in Bellefontaine are there for frivolous reasons. That's simply erroneous.
A couple of true stories.
When I was a teenager, an elderly lady lived up the road with her mentally disabled son. From what they could piece together at the time, it appeared that she had a heart attack and her son either went out in the snow and cold to try to find help or without his mother being able to stop him, just went outside. I don't think he was wearing a coat when they found him frozen to death in the field next to the house.
And if I remember correctly, a few years ago an elderly (I think terminally ill) physician in Carthage murdered his sick wife and his disabled son due to fear of what would happen to his son after his and his wife's death. I was horrified at the time. Thanks to Blunt and the republicans, I'm afraid that we all might see more of this. And that's why when I look at Blunt and you republicans, I see nothing good.
I think to some extent they may be taking the business point of
view. I think they see the disabled as a drain on the state's profit level and as such are to be cut back and/or eliminated. But I also think that some of them actively and aggressively hate the disabled and I wonder how many of them were school bullies.
When you consider the fact that so many of them claim to be church going christians it gets even more bizarre. A very cold-blooded bunch.
Remember the old saying...
Give a man a little power and his true character shines through!
The less fortunate are so easily pushed around and run over, not likely to vote in numbers large enough to do them damage.
I had a Deputy Sheriff in this county make the statement to me sometime ago that it was amazing how many people didn't know how to take care of their children or their animals. The rest of us have to do it for them.
It is hard to do when these "christians" are at the helm.