Disabled Kansans rally at Capitol for continuation of much-needed services

From The Wichita Eagle:

TOPEKA, Kan. - Seeking to hold onto their share of state funding in a desperate budget year, several hundred developmentally disabled Kansans and their supporters rallied in and near the state Capitol on April 30.

"We visited with legislators. We gave them a book," said Tommy Clinkingbeard of
Wichita, who came to Topeka as part of a contingent of clients from Arrowhead
West, a nonprofit group that provides services to adults and children with disabilities.

The book Clinkingbeard referred to contains brief synopses on nearly 4,000 Kansans with disabilities who are on waiting lists for services that could help them stay out of institutions and lead more productive lives.

"It's about the size of a small phone book," said Tom Laing, executive director of Interhab, an umbrella organization that advocates for the developmentally disabled and their service providers.

Attendees had planned to draw chalk outlines of 3,963 footprints on the Capitol steps in a symbolic protest representing each person on the waiting list.

But when heavy rain scratched that plan, demonstrators drew their footprints on butcher paper and moved their speakers from the south lawn of the Capitol to a conference center a couple of miles away.

Service providers say it takes about three to four years for a person to make it off the waiting list and into a program. That's too long, said Robyn Herzog, a developmentally disabled woman from Lawrence who addressed the rally.

"Most people do not even like to wait in line at the movies," she said. "This is life we're talking about!"

The disabled people gather each year to try to get more state funding to reduce waiting lists.

But this year, with the state trying to close a $328 million budget gap, the disabled will be lucky if they don't fall back, said Carolyn Risley Hill. She is executive director of Starkey Inc., a nonprofit organization that provides housing, training and other services for the developmentally disabled in Wichita.

Rising costs have led to stagnating wages and staff cuts at Starkey, which pays direct-care workers a starting salary of $8.55 an hour.

Recent aviation industry cutbacks have also hurt Starkey, which provides disabled people with jobs manufacturing small aircraft components in a sheltered workshop.

"We're OK this fiscal year, but we won't be OK next fiscal year," Hill said.

House Minority Leader Paul Davis, D-Lawrence, told the demonstrators that their advocacy is especially important this year so they don't lose funding.

"The likelihood of that money coming back to you (in the future) is not good," he said.

Rep. Bob Bethell, R-Alden, chairman of the House Aging and Long Term Care Committee, said he favors a proposal to put about $120 million of federal stimulus money toward eliminating waiting lists and raising wages for direct care workers.

Not only would that improve things for the disabled, it would also stimulate the economy because the low-wage workers would spend their additional wages.

Asked if he thought it had a chance of passing, he said "I don't know, but I can tell you I'm going to go down trying."