Colorado's new Medicaid funding plan will leave disabled adults on the outside

Surprise, surprise, a government bureaucrat saying "our changes had unintended consequences". Yeah, I want the government to manage my healthcare...

Thank you for writing this article. It does a very good job at capturing some of the problems faced in Colorado's system to serve people with disabilities.

This article was very upsetting for a number of reasons. The first one is the heartbreaking stories of the people involved. The examples given are of hard working taxpayers trying to give their high needs children the tools they need to get by in day to day life, while shouldering the majority of the responsibility themselves by keeping them at home. Secondly, instead of resources being awarded to these people, or at the very least unchanged, for keeping their loved ones out of the system and saving taxpayer money they are being punished for doing so?!?! Thirdly, it is disheartening, to say the least, to read about another governmental action that went into effect first and asked questions later. Oh, I'm sorry. They did ask questions. Then they skewed the results to allow for the same amount of funding to people whose needs were higher, so that they could scrimp on resources allotted. In my opinion as a resident of Colorado that's even worse. Our history in this country of how we’ve treated our developmentally disabled citizens is a disgrace. An outright disgrace.

Thank you for bringing this important issue to the attention of your readers.
How is it possible to base the removal of critical services to chronic patients based on the progress they have made due to the continued support provided by the same services? It is not rocket science to understand that chronic patients who have their care cut back or removed will backslide and downgrade at an alarming rate to the same level (or lower level) of ability they were at before services/care was provided -- making the rating used to remove their care immediately moot.

Great article. And, very important. Thanks so much for helping us who are trying to reverse this injustice shine some light on the matter. Now, let's hope your article will act like words from those who cannot speak and be seen/heard by the powers that be who can rectify this situation. It's mind boggling how we can continue to spend billions of dollars on things and reduce funding to the most vulnerable in our society who can't speak up and fend for themselves.

Paulette Mahurin, R.N. FNP

I have known the Wenlocks for many years and am aware of the devasating consequences to their son Sean of cuts that are being implemented for his care and the care of other severely disabled people. The article in this week's Westword does an excellent job of showing the human side of the story as well as the chain of bureaucratic spaghetti that brought it about. Our country is only as good as it cares for the most vulnerable on our shores. Whether you are Republican, Democrat or Independent, we can all agree that cuts to the severely disabled must not stand. For God's sake, find other areas of bloated government to cut, but don't take away necessary care for this helpless person and others like him.

These are my best friends.

I am having a moment of sheer emotion seeing this slideshow, and knowing the situation, having been a guest with Wenlocks on several occasions.

As a nurse I KNOW the importance of the caregiving Sean has been receiving. The deprivation being forced on this family, multiplied by the hundreds of families I don't know, throws me like a hurricane between anger and deep sorrow, frustration and utter disbelief.

How can bureaucrats just DO stuff like this?? Assigning arbitrary numbers to this human being and thereby shattering his very stability . . . Would they do this, were this their own situation?

I find this situation to be intolerable, and I am not affected by this as the Parents and their offspring by this mandate of Governmental SNAFU. Could there be a organized protest in front of the State Capital to let the media and concerned citizens know of this error of judgement? Is there a way that Denver Options or ARC could train volunteers to work with these challanged indivduals, to help at least for the parents to get a break and resume a somewhat normal schedule? And I mean a full check on the fitness of the volunteers to take on this respondsibility?

Governor Ritter as a First Term Governor of our State has not proved his affectiveness to meet the various crisis that have hit our State, his lack of involvement in this issue, again speaks volumes of his being ONLY a Governor for one term.

I work with children that have developmental disabilities in an inclusive setting and find this news appalling! The future is not so bright for the kids my organization (Mountain Day Camp) serves on a daily basis as they mature into adults.

I urge parents to be specific when reporting to make sure their SIS scores are accurate. I've found all too many times that families fail to report things when they become a day to day habit or part of the day to day care for their adult or child with a disability. Its not that the families want to omit something that could contribute to the success of their child, they just are so used to doing something or seeing something they forget to mention it. Thank you!

Somehow, the article failed to mention that, with all the financial crises, the director of Denver Options makes $234,813 in saalary plus $134,771 in benefits, for a total of $369,584.

Plus most of the directors and top admin staff make $100 - $200,000 in salaries plus benefits.

Perhaps belt-tightening should start at home?

Denver Options has the best PR around. They should have, it costs them over $105,000 per year just for the salary of the PR person.

And this is a "non-profit" organization? Yes, very non-profit for the parents and clients. Not so for the staff!!

Thank you for this article. It clearly articulates a very complex problem. I am the parent of two developmentally disabled children - one is a young adult and one is 12. The State of Colorado's response to the devastation that it has created for individuals with developmental disabilities and their families of "we will wait and see how bad it gets" is simply appalling!

The parent's group, Parents of Adults with Disabilities in COlorado (PAD-CO), has been working on this issue for some time, including correspondence and meeting with Sharon Jacksi and others.

To contact PAD-CO email

PADCOWEB@AOL.COM

My deep and sincere thanks to Westword and all the families who were part of this story. My son is level 4. We lost our provider who helps him to live safely in his own apartment because she can't live on the new pay scale. Next year, we will lose 1/2 of his funding as well. We need a place where all affected families can gather-because there are many others of us out here who have also been complaining bitterly-but nobody releases mailing addresses of families on these programs so it is hard to connect. Our next step is going to have to be a much more costly alternative to the state for my son. So there is yet another "unintended consequence". This state was already at the bottom. And the DDD is supposed to be taking leadership for us. Instead, we are playing wait and see? If only the public knew how very difficult it is for a person who has lost all of their activities that make like worthwhile to continue on like this. Parents have to devote at LEAST 50% of our time when we should be WORKING to advocacy for our kids. Shame on Colorado.

It's disgraceful that the state is attempting to balance the budget on the backs of those with disabilities. It sounds as though the old system was working very efficiently with the exception of it being 'outside of the box' when it came to accounting for its expenses. Why not develop another way to audit the program and not fix what isn't broken.

$38 MILLION DOLLARS MORE COULD BE AVAILABLE FOR DEVELOPMENTAL DISABILITY SERICES IN COLORADO.

Counties in Colorado contribute in the neighborhood of $38 million dollars to local Community Centered Boards, primarily through mil levies.

County mil levy funds can (and used to be) matched by the federal goovernment on a 1:1 basis (FMAP).

This was stopped a few years back because the feds said that Colorado was not following the correct procedures, and issued a "cease and desist" order.

In an email from a state official questioning why these changes have not been made, it was stated that the state and the Community Centered Boards desired not to make those administrative changes.

We have been engaged in a tremendous effort to find out the details of what those changes were and why the states and the Community Centered Boards would not make those changes. We have had no success. We want to know why $38 million was thrown away without consumer input.

Two weeks ago, we issued a press release all across the state, trying to get someone to help us find out why we were not receiving the $38 million federal money. Not one single newspaper or media outlet paid a bit of attention to this press release. It was as if $38 million for more services to individuals with disabilities was simply not important.

However, if there had been a contract for a baseball player for $38 million, one could bet for sure that the media would have paid attention.

Perhaps that #38 million could have helped Sean retain his services?

For more information, please contact

padcoweb@aol.com

A great article indeed...thank you for bringing this story to the attention of our community. This is outrageous, and I for one will be contacting my local officials to express my concern over such program cuts. Keep up the good fight!

This article makes me very sad for a of number of reasons. First, I am pretty sick and tired of hearing sob stories about how its the government's responsibility to take care of people. I can understand having difficulty taking care of your adult child. But why not think outside of the box and swap with someone else whose adult child needs support. Plus did anyone do the math? It looks like over $314 million should be enough to take care of less than 10,000 people. My guess, is Denver Options and Sharron Jacksi aren't working for free...

to save a nickel to only have to spend a dollar is NOT what our health care reform is supposed to be about. The longer the elderly and disabled can stay in their own loving homes with some support from the government the more that we all feel better. Who wants to live in an institution? and Who wants to save that nickel to find it now costs a dollar -- obviously a person who doesn't have his head in the right place.
nancy