Sharing Your Vision and Advocating that Our Rights Are Heard
By D'Arcy Robb, GCDD Public Policy Director
Community integration is the passion and vision that drives countless disability advocates. And, it leads to a challenge faced by many advocates – how do you effectively share the vision of what a truly integrated community is like? In the summer of 2013, the Judge David L. Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law unveiled a set of consensus principles that reflect the disability community's shared vision of community integration. Dozens of advocacy organizations, including Unlock the Waiting Lists!, are proud to endorse these principles. Below is a summary, created by Unlock and used with permission from Bazelon.
Take these principles and share them with your elected officials. As a community we must take action and make our voice and rights heard.
Principles of Community Integration
Individuals with disabilities should have the opportunity to live full, self-determined lives. This means they want the chance:
...to be employed
• In regular workplaces – not in settings with only other workers with disabilities
• Earning the same wages as people without disabilities
• With access to supported or customized employment services
...to have a place to call home
• In apartments or houses in a community that they've chosen
• With the opportunity to live in communities that are inclusive of residents with and without disabilities
• With the opportunity for ownership or control of the lease
• Alone or with others that they've chosen – and no one else
• Where they decide who visits and when
• Without the threat of losing that home because they didn't comply with a treatment plan
...to be engaged in their communities with family and friends
• Who understand and appreciate their gifts and contributions
• With access to an array of educational and leisure pursuits
• Able to go to a full range of locations and activities that they've chosen
...to have control over how they spend their time
• With adequate information so that they make informed choices from an array of meaningful options
• With a schedule of daily activities based on their personal priorities, interests and contributions
• Choosing when and what to eat, and what to watch on television
And what individuals with disabilities DON'T want is:
• To be offered sheltered work, day treatment and other segregated programs as the only options
• To be offered group homes, congregate arrangements and multi-unit complexes for people with disabilities as the only options
• To have their daily activities determined by a collective schedule
• To hear that "we've always done it this way"
But, what individuals with disabilities and those who support them in advocacy DO want is:
• To have their legitimate concerns and fears understood and addressed with accurate
information
• To continue to learn about the options available to them and what those have meant for others with disabilities
• For government funding to support these principles, rather than the continued "institutional bias" that perpetuates antiquated models of service
Working to Make Positive Changes with the 2014 Legislative Agenda
As many of you reading this article know, the mission of the Georgia Council on Developmental Disabilities (GCDD) is to bring about social and policy changes that promote opportunities for persons with developmental disabilities and their families to live, learn, work, play and worship in Georgia communities.
We know that Georgians with disabilities want to live full lives in our communities, and they are fully capable of doing so. And we know that if we, the citizens of Georgia, choose to make positive changes to our system, more and more people with disabilities will be working in our communities, living with their families, friends or independently as they so choose, and will be contributing to their communities all across the State. When all of our citizens, including those with disabilities, are able to use their gifts and talents and pursue their dreams, it creates a better Georgia for us all. The big question is, how do we work together to get there? If the description above sounds like the Georgia you want to live in, I encourage you to get involved with our statewide advocacy for our 2014 legislative agenda. You can make appointments with your state representative and state senator and share this article with them. (If you want to keep the magazine for yourself – and I don't blame you! – go to gcdd.org to print out separate copies of our 2014 legislative agenda to share with your state representative and state senator. (If you're not sure who your state representative and senator are, you can find out by going to www.votesmart.org and entering your home address.)
While you're at gcdd.org, be sure to sign up for our advocacy network. And of course, we hope to see you at our annual Disability Day, Georgia's largest advocacy rally held on the steps of the State Capitol on Thursday, February 20, 2014 this year.
Getting involved and staying knowledgeable in our political processes is one of the most important things you can do to help make positive system changes for not only your whole community, but also yourself. Read on for information about the centerpieces of GCDD's advocacy agenda for the 2014 General Assembly ...
Support & Expand Inclusive Post-Secondary Education
Inclusive Post-Secondary Education provides opportunities for students with intellectual disabilities to access higher education. This education prepares them to live increasingly independent lives and pursue careers of their choice.
Charlie Miller, a first-year student at the Academy for Inclusive Learning and Social Growth at Kennesaw State University (KSU) says, "The best way I can explain inclusive learning is it's a chance to fully express yourself out from under your mom and dad's wing, into being a productive person in society."
Indeed, there are major economic benefits to Inclusive Post-Secondary Education. Individuals with intellectual disabilities who receive post-secondary education are more likely to find paid employment than those who don't, and their earnings are 73% higher than peers who do not receive postsecondary education.
Currently Georgia has one Inclusive Postsecondary Education Program, the Academy for Inclusive Learning and Social Growth at KSU, with three more aiming to open their doors in the fall of 2014. GCDD's legislative advocacy will be to ...
• Support and increase funding for Inclusive Post-Secondary Education programs by $200,000.
• Increase student access to inclusive higher education through scholarship availability.
Support Georgians with Developmental Disabilities Who Want to Work
Supported employment assists Georgians with disabilities to find and keep jobs in their communities. The majority of Georgians with developmental disabilities want to work, but only 14% of individuals with developmental disabilities in our State are currently employed in the community.2
When Georgians with disabilities get the support they need to work, they thrive. GCDD member Evan Nodvin is one example of an individual who is thriving with supported employment– he has been working full-time with senior citizens at the Weinstein Adult Day Center at the Marcus Jewish Community of Atlanta for the past 13 years and recently received a promotion.
And once again, there's a big economic benefit to supported employment. Not only do Georgians with developmental disabilities want to work, but when they do, it benefits all taxpayers. For every dollar put into supported employment programs in Georgia, taxpayers reap $1.61 in benefits.3
This session, GCDD will advocate for ...
• Increased funding for supported employment so that more Georgians with developmental disabilities can go to work in their communities – $1,960,000 for supported employment in the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities (DBHDD) budget will support approximately 250 more Georgians with developmental disabilities to work in their communities.
Offer Georgians with Developmental Disabilities the Opportunity to Live in Homes of Their Own
Currently, Georgia's developmental disability system will pay for a person to live in someone else's house but will not support that person to live in a home of his own. The DBHDD has established a highly successful housing voucher program for individuals with severe persistent mental illness, but right now, that option is not available to persons with developmental disabilities.
In the 2014 legislative session, GCDD will advocate to ...
• Provide funding to expand DBHDD's highly successful housing voucher program so it includes individuals with developmental disabilities – $480,000 will support approximately 100 Georgians to live in their own house or apartment.
Rebalance Georgia's System from Facilities to the Community: Unlock the Waiting Lists!
As advocates are well aware, virtually all Georgians with disabilities and aging Georgians would rather live in their own homes and communities than go to a
nursing facility.
Not only do Georgians want to remain in their communities, there is increasing evidence that supporting people in the community is significantly less expensive than caring for them in a facility. The Money Follows the Person program (MFP) identifies
Georgians living in facilities such as nursing homes, who want to live in the community, and helps them move and get support in the community. Over the past five years, Georgia has saved over $22 million under MFP by moving people out of facility care and into community settings.4
In true Unlock the Waiting Lists! style, this year we have a broad ask that focuses on a wide array of needs. More specifically, GCDD will advocate to ...
• Rebalance the system so that more Georgians can get support in the community instead of facilities. Support the full agenda of Unlock the Waiting Lists! in order to support Georgians with disabilities and aging Georgians who wish to live their lives in the community.
For more information on our full Unlock the Waiting Lists! ask and agenda for the 2014 session, see page 18. And remember, to keep up with Unlock, you can always go to www.unlockthewaitinglists.com
Change the Standard to Prove Intellectual Disabilities in Capital Punishment Cases
In 2002, the US Supreme Court said it is wrong to execute a person with intellectual disabilities. But right now in Georgia, it is extremely hard for an individual to prove in court that they have intellectual disabilities. Georgia is the only one of the 50 states that requires a person to prove "beyond a reasonable doubt" that they have intellectual disabilities in order to be exempt from the death penalty.
GCDD will advocate to ...
• Change the legal standard of proof for proving intellectual disabilities in O.C.G.A. 17-7-131 to "preponderance of the evidence," which is the standard used in most other states.
Support Georgians who Care for Their Families: The Family Care Act, HB 290
Many Georgians balance their work lives with caring for their families. The Family Care Act would allow Georgians who have earned sick leave to use up to five days of that leave to care for sick or injured members of their immediate family. The Family Care Act does NOT add any additional sick days or require employers to provide them; it only allows Georgians to use the sick days they've already earned to care for family members. GCDD will ...
• Support House Bill 290, the Family Care Act, sponsored by Representative Katie Dempsey.
So those items are the "meat" of our legislative agenda for 2014! In addition, GCDD is also proud to support ...
• Individual Development Account legislation that would support Georgians with disabilities as they save for an accessible vehicle, communication devices, investments in their own businesses, higher education or home modifications;
• An "Employment First" policy that would make employment in the community the first option for persons with disabilities;
• Changes to Georgia's high school diploma system that will give more students with disabilities the opportunity to obtain diplomas and access further
career and educational opportunities;
• New Home Access legislation that would increase accessibility in all new single family homes;
• Expansion of Medicaid under the Patient Protection & Affordable Care Act; and
• A cost-of-living adjustment up to 5% for providers of services and supports to persons with disabilities.
And of course, you never know what surprises the legislative session will bring – all the more reason to sign up for our grassroots advocacy network at gcdd.org!
References:
1. Migliore, A., Butterworth, J., & Hart, D. (2009). Post-Secondary Education and Employment Outcomes for Youth with Intellectual Disabilities. Think College
Fast Facts. No 1. www.thinkcollege. net/publications/fast-facts.
2. National Core Indicators 2011- 2012. National Association of State Directors of Developmental
Disabilities Services and Human Services Research Institute. www. nationalcoreindicators.org/charts/.
3. Robert E. Cimera (2010) National Cost Efficiency of Supported Employees With Intellectual
Disabilities: 2002 to 2007. American Journal on Intellectual andDevelopmental Disabilities: January
2010, Vol. 115, No. 1, pp. 19-29.
4. Georgia Money Follows the Person, Department of Community Health. Sept. 12, 2013.
