Monthly Archives: July 2014

Institutionalized Lives

The videos here may contain graphic images and parental guidance is advised.

Suffer the Little Children (1968) of Pennhurst State Home (PA)

Forgotten People by Mental Disability Rights International.

Olmstead: A Case for Community Support

Where’s Molly? The full-length documentary is available for viewing the the OK DD Council.

Matthew’s Story from Not Home: A Documentary About Kids Living in Nursing Facilities.

OK Public Housing

The Public Housing Program, under the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) was established to provide decent and safe rental housing for eligible low-income families, including persons with disabilities.

Eligibility is determined by: 
1) Annual gross income. Income limits vary from town to town and county to county!

2) Whether you qualify as elderly, a person with a disability, or as a family

3) U.S. citizenship or eligible immigration status.

You will be asked to provide references, which will be checked, to make sure you and your family will be good tenants.

How DO I Apply?

If you are interested in applying for public housing, contact your local HA.

HUD also addresses these questions:

1. As a person with a disability, what are my housing rights?  What are my rights as they relate to HUD Public Housing?

2. What kind of housing assistance is available to persons with disabilities?

3. I feel I may have experienced housing discrimination because of my disability. What can I do?

A directory of OK Public Housing Authority offices is here.

Visitability & Home Design

Visitability is a disability advocacy movement to create systemic change in new home construction so that all persons can feel welcomed.  Thinking about these issues as you build or participate in city planning is a great Partners practice!

Learn more at Concrete Change as well as Advocating for Universal Design.

Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (2014)

The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act significantly limits placements at sheltered workshops and other work environments where people with disabilities earn less than minimum wage.

Under the new law, individuals with disabilities age 24 and younger will no longer be allowed to work for less than the federal minimum of $7.25 per hour unless they first receive pre-employment transition services at school and try vocational rehabilitation services.

See entire article at Disability Scoop for June 22, 2014.

Restoring Voting Rights under Guardianship

Oklahoma is one of many states that can automatically remove the right of an adult to vote once they are placed under a guardianship.  The potential ward, guardian or other adults can make persuasive statements to the judge to protect an adult’s right to vote.  However, a judge’s ruling of “total incompetence” does include denying voting rights (fact checked with the Oklahoma Disability Law Center).  The process to have voting rights restored is available here.

Informed Decisions About Guardianship

The following explain guardianship as well as other options:

Oklahoma’s Senior Law Center publishes  Striking a Balance as well as Who Decides?

A state by state guide on adult guardianship can be found here.

A brief article, Guardianship Is Not Self-Determination, by Kathy Harris, 2012.

Here is the Oklahoma law concerning guardians and wards:

 Title 30. Guardian and Ward
    Oklahoma Guardianship and Conservatorship Act
      Appointment of Guardian
        Article Article III – Adults
        Section 3-106 – Rights of Incapacitated or Partially Incapacitated Person –     

A. In all hearings conducted pursuant to Article III of the Oklahoma Guardianship and Conservatorship Act, an individual who is alleged to be or found to be an incapacitated or partially incapacitated person shall have a right to:

1. Notice as provided in Section 3-110 of this title;

2. Be present at such hearings;

3. Compel the attendance of witnesses;

4. Present evidence;

5. Cross-examine witnesses;

6. Appeal adverse orders and judgments as provided by the rules of civil procedure;

7. Representation by court-appointed counsel upon request; and

8. Request that the proceedings be closed to the public.

B. The requirement of notice to the subject of the proceeding shall not be waived. The requirement that the subject of the proceeding be present at a hearing may be waived only for good cause shown. The court shall make inquiries to determine whether there is sufficient cause to waive the right to be present. Whenever the requirement that the subject of the proceeding be present is waived, the court shall make a finding on the record as to the reason the subject of the proceeding is not present at the proceeding and the alternatives which were considered to enable the subject of the proceeding to be present.

C. Any person may apply for permission to participate in a proceeding or to be admitted to a proceeding which has been closed to the public. The court may grant the request to participate upon determining that the best interest of the subject of the proceeding will be served thereby. The court may, for good cause shown, grant the request of such person for permission to be admitted to the closed proceeding upon determining that said person has a legitimate interest in the proceedings. In granting either request, the court may impose any appropriate conditions it deems necessary.

D. If the subject of the proceeding is under the influence of psychotropic medication, during any judicial hearing held pursuant to the Oklahoma Guardianship and Conservatorship Act, the court shall be advised of this fact, the purpose of the medication, and the effect which it may have on the individual’s actions, demeanor and participation at the hearing.

E. Statements of individuals alleged or found to be partially incapacitated or incapacitated persons made during the course of the evaluations, examinations and treatment pursuant to the Oklahoma Guardianship and Conservatorship Act shall be privileged and confidential. Such statements shall not be admissible without the individual’s consent in any civil or criminal proceeding other than a proceeding held pursuant to the Oklahoma Guardianship and Conservatorship Act.

F. A party to a proceeding held pursuant to the Oklahoma Guardianship and Conservatorship Act may be relieved of court costs and filing fees as specified by Section 152 of Title 28 of the Oklahoma Statutes or as provided by Section 192 of Title 56 of the Oklahoma Statutes.

G. At the request of any party to a proceeding pursuant to the provisions of the Oklahoma Guardianship and Conservatorship Act, the court shall order that a stenographic or mechanical record of the proceeding be made.

 

What Does That Mean?

“Disability world” is filled with acronyms, diagnoses and terms we may be unfamiliar with. The resources below are helpful and we encourage you to share them in your communities.

The Alphabet Soup Book is a publication by  the Center for Learning and Leadership/Oklahoma’s University Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities (UCEDD) hat explains disability-related acronyms.

The Center for Parent Information and Resources has a similar web-based resource.

Parents with Disabilities

The National Council on Disability freely provides a 400+ page report on the experiences of parents with disabilities.

Through the Looking Glass is parent education agency, based in CA, that supports parents who have disabilities in their child rearing choices.  They also focus on finding baby and child items that can accommodate patents with disabilities.

The Cost and Value of Caregiving

Diana McCalment, Designs for Progress, 2012

In 2009, there were 596,000 Oklahoma citizens acting as caregivers. They provided an estimated 570,000,000 hours of care giving with an annual market value of $6,000,000,000. The economic value of each hour of care in Oklahoma was estimated at $10.44 per hour. This includes caregiving for elderly family members and for family members with intellectual disabilities.1

Long term caregiving has significant financial consequences for caregivers, particularly for women. Informal caregivers who leave the workforce when they are 50 years of age or older personally lose about $303,880over a lifetime: $115,900 in wages, $137,980 in Social Security benefits, and conservatively $50,000 in pension benefits. 1

Caregivers face the loss of income of the care recipient, loss of their own income if they reduce their work hours or leave their jobs, loss of employer-based medical benefits, shrinking of savings to pay caregiving costs, and a threat to their retirement income due to fewer contributions to pensions and other retirement vehicles.

On March 22, 2012, 6,563 people with intellectual disabilities were receiving care in a parent or relative’s home, having requested services from the Department of Human Services. Assuming each person has a caregiver, that means over 6563 Oklahomans were involved in long term caregiving for people with intellectual disabilities. 2

 If the national statistics for economic impact quoted above are used, that means Oklahomans caring for people on the Waiting List loose $1,993,839,400 in wages over their lifetimes. At a 5% state income tax rate, the state of Oklahoma looses $99,691,970 in potential state tax dollars. However, those numbers are based on a person leaving the workforce at age 50. For many of the caregivers involved with people with disabilities, the age at which they left the workforce was much earlier.

Another facet of caregiving is the economic value of the service provided. If each caregiver for a person on the Waiting List provided only 40 hours of care per week, 50 weeks a year, the economic value of their caregiving would be $137,035,440 annually. Obviously, most caregivers provide the service more than 40 hours per week.

Caregiving also has a substantial impact on business. Lost productivity due to informal caregiving costs businesses $33.6 billion per year.4 These costs include those associated with replacing employees, absenteeism, workday distractions, supervisory time, and reductions in hours from full-time to part-time. The average annual cost to employers per full-time employed caregiver is $2,110.3

Additionally, recent research shows a link between employed family caregivers of older relatives and their health care costs. In this study, employers were found to be paying about 8 percent more for the health care of employees with eldercare responsibilities compared to non caregiving employees, potentially costing U.S. businesses an additional estimated $13.4 billion per year.4

Working caregivers often suffer many work-related difficulties due to their “second careers” as caregivers. Sixty-seven percent of family caregivers report conflicts between caregiving and employment, resulting in reduced work hours or unpaid leave.6

 ___________________________________________________________________________________

1 AARP Public Policy Institute. Valuing the Invaluable: 2011 Update: The Growing Contributions and Costs of Family Caregiving. Washington, DC.

2 www.OKWaitinglist.org: March 22, 2012 Notes from the Waiting List Meeting

MetLife Mature Market Institute and NAC, MetLife Caregiving Study: Productivity Losses to U.S. Business (Westport, CT: MetLife Mature Market Institute, and Bethesda, MD: NAC, 2006). The lost productivity estimates are based on the 2004 survey of U.S. caregivers conducted by NAC and AARP, Caregiving in the U.S. 2004.

4 MetLife Mature Market Institute, NAC, and University of Pittsburgh, MetLife Study of Working Caregivers and Employer Health Care Costs (Westport, CT: MetLife Mature Market Institute, February 2010).

5 Metropolitan Life Insurance Company and National Alliance for Caregiving (1997, June). The Metlife study of employer costs for working caregivers. Connecticut: Metropolitan Life Insurance Company.

6 Family Caregiver Alliance (2009). 2009 National Policy Statement. San Francisco, CA.