McHenry County Blog

Below is a press release from Governor Pat Quinn.  It was issued the day after the election when a referendum failed about 2-1 to create a 377 Board to distribute $9 million of newly-levied property taxes in McHenry County.

I heard this story on the radio, but have not seen it in print.  Considering the discussion prior to election day, I think its contents should be more widely know in McHenry County.

Talking to state officials I learned that this initiative is partially a result of a class action law suit won in which Woodstock’s Stanley Lelgas was the lead plaintiff.   You can read the story here, but I’m going to republish the 2011 piece so those interested in the adequacy of service to the developmentally disabled can have the background close at hand.

Besides the court-ordered mandate to change the way that the State of Illinois treats the developmentally disabled, I certainly am willing to give Governor Quinn for continuing the efforts of former Pioneer Center Director Ann Patla, who served as Governor George Ryan’s Department Director for Mental Health and Developmentally Disabled.  For the first time, she put more money into community services than into institutions.  (You can find the current difference in cost in the press release below, not to mention the humane arguments for not having the developmentally disabled institutionalized.)

Governor Quinn Addresses “Going Home” Rally

Governor’s Rebalancing Initiative is Increasing Community Care and Reducing the Number of Outdated, Expensive Institutions

SPRINGFIELD – Governor Quinn today addressed the “Going Home” rally, hosted by several disability advocacy groups, and emphasized his commitment to improving the lives of people with developmental disabilities and mental challenges in Illinois.

As part of his agenda to ensure all people have the opportunity to follow their dreams and reach their full potential, Governor Quinn launched his Rebalancing Initiative in 2011 to increase community care and reduce the number of outdated, expensive institutions.

In the last several years, the governor has closed two State-Operated Developmental Centers (SODCs), and increased community care options in Illinois which are proven to provide

• a higher quality
• more independent life

according to numerous studies. A third institution – the Warren G. Murray Developmental Center – is slated for closure later this year.

“This is a historic time for Illinois as we continue our commitment to change the status quo and improve life for people with disabilities and mental health challenges in Illinois,” Governor Quinn said.

“Moving from outdated institutions to community care is improving Illinois’ quality of care and allowing people to lead more independent and fulfilling lives.”

Hundreds of supporters and advocates gathered today in support of the governor’s Rebalancing Initiative.

Numerous studies show that individuals living in the community have a better quality of life than those living in large institutions.

Community settings allow individuals to receive the care they need, including 24-hour care.

In addition, community care is also significantly less costly than institution-based care.

The average cost for Murray Center is $239,000 per year per resident, while the average cost for a Murray resident living in the community while receiving the supports they need is estimated at $120,000 per year.

The governor’s proposed fiscal year 2014 budget will move 1,150 individuals into community living, home-based services including 500 individuals off of the waiting list.

The Quinn Administration has developed a comprehensive, person-centered plan to transition residents safely into the community, ensuring that each individual’s new home meets their specific needs.

The plan is being implemented carefully and responsibly over the next several months to ensure a smooth transition for residents.

“We are working closely with families and guardians using a person-centered planning process to ensure safe transitions for residents of Murray Center,” Kevin Casey, director of the Illinois Department of Human Services (IDHS) Division of Developmental Disabilities said.

“We developed a comprehensive, well thought out plan to transition Murray residents safely into the community and ensure that each individual’s new home will meet their specific needs.”

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Editor’s note: I’m leaving this story near the top because I am so infuriated at the misleading recorded telephone call I received Friday night asking me to vote for the 10 cent per $100 of assessed valuation tax increase. I don’t mind emotional pitches, but saying voting for a tax will save us money is too, too outrageous to let pass unnoticed.

Since writing this, Fox River Grove Republican Precinct Committeeman has published the table you see below on his blog.

Look near the bottom and, then, the right hand column.

You will see residents in McHenry County are the 25th highest taxed in the whole country when taxes are compared to income.  We have the 29th highest property taxes.

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Written Thursday night, April 4th-

Even as I was listening to the 377 Board tax hike robo-call, I couldn’t believe my ears.

Misleading at best and deliberately deceitful at worst, I concluded.

I dealt with the frustrations of parents with developmentally disabled children the entire sixteen years I served as State Representative, eight years in the 1970′s and eight years in the 1990′s.

I know that the state employees union, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), does everything it can to protect state employee’s jobs.

Even if it means housing DD individuals in state facilities which cost $100,000 a year per person, as the robo-caller said.

Cost-benefit analysis does not make any difference to such unions.

It certainly is cheaper, but, more importantly, more humane, to house those who cannot fully take care of themselves in neighborhood locations.

Whether it costs the small amount (which I did not jot down, but seemed low to me ) asserted in the robo-call is true or not, I do not know.

I do know it is not the job of taxpayers in McHenry County to pay for services State government should be providing.

The admonition of the robo-caller to “keep tax dollars right her in McHenry County rather than send[ing] them off to Springfield” is made of the stuff that used to be below my grandmother’s outhouse in Crumpton, Maryland.

No one is going to reduce State taxes on McHenry County residents if people vote to raise their property taxes by ten cents for every $100 of assessed valuation.

And our real estate taxes don’t get sent to Springfield.

The quoted assertion above would never hold up in an open forum.

It is too ridiculous.

It is meant to delude the–what do the pundits call them?–low information voters.

If people vote “Yes” on the 377 Board referendum, State taxes will not be cut for us.

But that is what the robo-caller wants people to believe.

Passage of the referendum will mean property taxes will be increased $9 million next year, with more to come every year thereafter.

$60 for a $200,000 home to start; $90 for a $300,000 home.

More if the real estate market increases the value of your home.

My memory of sixteen years in the Illinois General Assembly tells me that raising taxes in McHenry County for the 708 Mental Health Board encouraged Springfield decision makers to send us less than our fair share.

That’s because State bureaucrats perceived that other parts of the state without local funding needed the state subsidies more.

So, by increasing our property taxes still more for purposes for which the 708 Board funding was created, we will probably be contributing to our getting even less than comes now.

Let me give another reminder of the pushers of this tax hike with memories that do not go back to the late 1960′s when the Mental Health Board was created by referendum.

It was supported by both those seeking mental health funding and those seeking funding for those who were then called “retarded.”

As McHenry County Treasurer, when tax anticipation warrants were issued after the first tax levy was passed, I personally took $25,000 checks to both Pioneer Center, then housed in the old Terra Cotta School, and to Family Services, headquarted down the street toward the Fox River from McHenry East High School’s campus.

The 708 Board got about $15 million last year.

If half of it did not got for DD services, why did the McHenry County Board approve its budget?

The Board members certainly did not have to.

And, if this referendum fails, as I hope it will, the County Board can tell the 708 Board what type of a budget it will approve and what will be unacceptable.

By the way, I fought to shift money from such DD state institutions to community care, finally seeing Governor George Ryan’s Mental Health and DD Department Director Ann Patla, a former head of Pioneer Center, submit such a budget.

That’s the fight proponents of this referendum should be fighting…rather than trying to pry money out of our pockets.

Back in the 1990′s I was on the House Appropriations Committee before which the budget of the Department of Mental Health and Developmental Disabilities came.

When Governor George Ryan took office, he named a former Director of McHenry County’s Pioneer Center, Ann Patla, Director of the Department of Mental Health and Developmental Disabilities.

Each year I had asked the percentage of the budget going to state institutions and the percentage to community groups.

The bureaucracy, AFSCME union and its Democratic Party legislators wanted the money to keep flowing to state developmentally disabilities institutions.

Jobs for state employees were the main priority, not caring for those institutionalized in what might be characterized as the most restrictive location.

Ryan’s Director was the first to propose a budget with a majority going to community care.

Now I see in the Chicago Tribune that a suit with its lead plaintiff, Stanley Lilgas, living in Sheltered Village’s 96-bed facility in Woodstock, has won a 2005 lawsuit to allow him to move to a less restrictive place to live.

Progress has been made. One of two Tribune articles on the suit reports that most of the money no longer goes to AFSCME-organized state institutions.

But Illinois is still a backwards state.

States like Alaska and Vermont have 98% of their people with intellectual and developmental disabilities living in settings of six or fewer.

Illinois ranks 50th (out of 51) with 38% in such community settings.

Blame it on the public employee union and politicians supporting them.

One source quoted in this article says it costs $55,000 a year to support an individual in a group home, but $192,000 in a state institution.

Part of the reason is undoubtedly that those working in group homes are paid much less than state employees.

Part of the problem is that parents of adults who need support or supervision of one sort or another are getting older.

When I was still in office, I would get calls pleading for help when a parent would be in failing health.

They had spent their lives making sure their children were cared for as well as they could, but were at a loss as to what to do as they became unable to continue such care.

Sometimes a phone call would help.

Sometimes there were no openings.

McHenry County’s mental health tax has long been a magnate for such families. Parents know their children are more likely to receive appropriate care here than elsewhere.

Now, as University of Illinois at Chicago Professor Mary Kay Rizzolo puts it, Illinois will have to “either reallocate money that is going to state-operated developmental centers or come up with new funding for community support services,” the Tribune reports.

In a state with as many financial problems as Illinois, the cost-reducing mandate of the Federal court should be a no-brainer.

It’s not only the compassionate thing to do, it is the way to save money.

When I was running against Rod Blagojevich for Governor in 2002, Blagojevich attached Governor Ryan’s proposal to close the Lincoln DD Center.

Ryan was acting logically, while Blagojevich was acting politically.

Votes over cost savings.

Votes over the best interests of the clients.

When I was the Republican Spokesman on the Illinois House Appropriations Committee that handled the budget for the Department of Mental Health and Developmental Disabilities, one of my goals was to get at least 50% of the money into community services.

Think about it.

If you needed supervision, would you rather live in an institution or a home near your family or even at home?

I think the answer is obvious.

It was not until Governor George Ryan appointed Barrington’s Ann Patla director that I got cooperation from the Executive Branch. Patla headed up Pioneer Center before becoming agency head.

One year when I asked my annual question of the budget percentage going to non-institutional care, Patla told me it was over 50%.

Not much over 50%, but more than half.

Now, the folks Governor Pat Quinn appointed to look at cost cutting agree:

“We believe that every individual with developmental disabilities should be given a meaningful choice to live and remain in his or her community,” is in that part of their report, which is below.

From the June report from the Illinois Tax Review Board, I’m assuming that putting too much money into the expensive institutional part of the care still exists.

Indeed, one of Rod Blagojevich’s key campaign pitches was to keep open or to open institutions like Lincoln Developmental Center whose costs clearly outweighed their benefits. He went from facility to facility holding rallies set up by AFSCME. I ran into one in Canton while campaigning against him for governor on the Libertarian Party ticket in 2002.

Let’s take a look at page 37 and 38 and see what the folks given the task of suggesting budget cuts came up with:

Enhance community options for people with developmental disabilities that are living in State or privately-run institutions:

The Division of Developmental Disabilities (DDD) provides services to adults with developmental disabilities who are living in their homes and communities, or in institutional settings.

Currently, there are 2,385 individuals served in nine State-Operated Developmental Centers (SODCs), which provide residential and program services to those with developmental disabilities needing active treatment programs and intensive supervision.

One of the SODCs, the Howe Development Center, is a de-certified facility, serving approximately 289 adults at an average annual cost per beneficiary of $186,573.

The average cost per individual of the remaining SODCs is $142,533.

In addition, there are over 300 private intermediate care facilities for persons with disabilities (ICF/DD) that are currently serving 5,648 adults at an average annual cost per beneficiary of $57,428.

Both SODCs and private ICF/DDs are certified and operate under the same federal regulations.

There is also a network of Community Integrated Living Arrangements (CILA), in which approximately 200 community-based organizations provide services to 7,240 people with disabilities on a 24-hour basis, at an average annual cost of $53,291. Services provided by these centers include advocacy, peer counseling, skills training, information and referral.

Finally, there are 3,055 people with disabilities that currently receive home-based services at an annual individual cost of $19,852.

All other individuals with disabilities are being served on a Average Annual Per Person Cost Waiver program, in which they receive day services at an average cost of approximately $12,000 per year. (12)

Illinois relies disproportionately on high-cost institutional settings rather than less costly community settings or shared living environments to serve the needs of these individuals.

According to recent state comparisons, (13) Illinois ranks at the very bottom – 51st – out of all states, including the District of Columbia, in serving adults with disabilities in settings of six persons or less.

We believe that every individual with developmental disabilities should be given a meaningful choice to live and remain in his or her community.

Many of the beneficiaries who are currently being served in high-cost institutions in Illinois could be served in the community with quality services at a much lower price.

States such as New Hampshire, Maine, Florida, Oregon, and Wisconsin have developed shared living environments that serve individuals in an independent foster care-like setting.

In 2006, 70.5% of all persons nationwide were supported in living arrangements for six or fewer people – Illinois can take advantage of these best practices to make successful community transitions.

The State should immediately begin pursuing aggressive strategies to reduce the number of individuals with developmental disabilities in institutional care, including:

• Exploring the potential closure of some of Illinois’ State-Operated Developmental Centers (SODCs).
• Pursuing the immediate closure of Howe Developmental Center. The Department of Human Services has recommended to the TAB the closure of this facility, and the TAB supports this department’s recommendation. The decision was based on a number of factors:
  1. concerns from the U.S. Department of Justice,
  2. the need to ensure quality of care for all residents, the decertification of the facility under the federal Medicaid program,
  3. the facility’s inability to regain certification, and
  4. the continued loss of over $2 million of federal matching funds per month.
• Investing some of the savings from closing these facilities in enhancing the capacity and services available in the community.

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(12) It should be noted that the CILA, home-based services and private ICF/DD annual costs reflected above do not include pharmacy or other medical services funded through the Medicaid State Plan. The ICF/DD and CILA costs do include some nursing services provided at the residential settings.

Nevertheless, the large disparity in costs associated with private and community services versus those delivered by the State, even after taking into consideration additional Medicaid medical services, clearly supports the TAB strategy addressed below.

(13) “The State of the States in Developmental Disabilities: 2008,” Washington, DE. American Association Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities. Braddock, D., Hemp, R. and Rizzolo, M.C. (2008)