Budget cuts mean loss of personal assistance services in Illinois

From the Pekin Times in Illinois:

PEORIA HEIGHTS, Ill. -- Advocates for Access Executive Director Melody Reynolds said she has been losing sleep since Gov. Pat Quinn announced his intent to cancel a state program that provides personal assistant services to all Illinois centers for independent living, effective Sept. 30.

“My total operating budget is just under $475,000,” Reynolds said. “This one particular grant is $84,292. That’s almost an 18 percent cut.”

The bad news came the day after Quinn announced last week that he would only cut human services funding by 10 percent, rather than the 50 percent he said he would cut a month and a half ago.

“We’d basically been at war trying to get that cut reduced or cancelled,” Reynolds said. “So I was breathing a sigh of relief over that, and then on Tuesday they announced they’re eliminating funds for the personal assistant program. So I’m back to earth-shattering with this cut.”

Advocates for Access, which is stationed in Peoria Heights, was established 25 years ago and serves Peoria, Woodford, Fulton and Tazewell counties. The organization helps disabled people achieve independence by providing independent living skills training, information and referral services, peer support services, and systems change advocacy, which involves efforts to change policies to make government, transportation and housing systems more accessible to people with disabilities.

“Recent statistics show that one out of five people has a disability,” Reynolds said. “That means we provide services for 20 percent of the population.”

One of the group’s main goals is to enable disabled people to live in a home setting rather than in a nursing home or institution. This provides a higher quality of life for the consumer, Reynolds said, and saves taxpayers money.

Paying for personal assistant aid to a disabled person living in his or her own home costs the state less than paying for that person to live in a nursing home or other institution, Reynolds said — about $35,000 less per person per year.

Cutting personal assistant programs would be extremely short-sighted, Reynolds said.

“Each year we receive $84,292 for the personal assistance program,” she said, “and we serve four counties. This program has provided services to over 130 consumers over the past year, which has saved over $4 million. Cutting this program would make no sense.”

Advocates for Access maintains a database of qualified personal assistants to give to clients upon request, Reynolds said.

According to a press release issued by the organization, “a PA coordinator serves as a liaison between the consumer, the PA and the Department of Human Services in ensuring quality services are received by the person with a disability.”

Before personal assistants are added to the list, Reynolds said, they are screened, given an orientation and trained. The assistants on the list are also required to participate in continuing education, she said. Problems with an assistant, including theft, are often reported to Advocates for Access, which corrects the problem and reports the PA if necessary.

With no one to keep an eye on the quality of care being provided to people, Reynolds said, “their health and safety will greatly decrease. Without us to follow up with our consumers, a person with a disability may not get fed, get their medications or sit for days in their diaper. They could die, literally. There is no question.”

In the 25 years since Advocates for Access has been established, Reynolds said, the organization has only received three cost-of-living allowance increases of 3 percent each.

Grant money received for the personal assistant program is used not only for that program alone, Reynolds said, but also for general costs to keep the center open. Losing this grant would mean more than just losing the program, she said.

“We’re drastically underfunded,” she said. “Rent, overhead costs, salaries, computer expenses, and then you add medical insurance costs — that has all increased exponentially in the last 25 years. Our budget line items can’t be cut anymore.”

Personnel and fringe benefits are the only things left to cut, Reynolds said, and she only has 10 employees as it is. If this cut goes through, she said, she will be forced to let three of those employees go.

“That’s 30 percent of my staff I will lose,” she said.

Reynolds said Illinois is already ranked last in the nation for offering community-based services, such as Advocates for Access, rather than placing disabled people in nursing homes or institutions. This budget cut will further support that “infamous title,” she said.

In the state of Illinois, more than 20 percent of people in nursing homes are under the age of 60, Reynolds said, but are placed there because there is no one to help care for them. Advocates for Access can get those people out of the nursing homes and put them back into their own homes, living independently, she said.

Reynolds organized a press conference today to address the proposed cut and the threat she believes it will pose to disabled Illinois residents if it goes through.

“The governor can easily change his mind on this one,” Reynolds said. “It saves everyone money to reinstate this grant. It saves taxpayers, consumers and family members of the disabled, who will have to take on their care.”

“This is a war that has to be fought because people are going to die on this one.”