OLMSTEAD PLANNING MUST INCLUDE CHILDREN

Children with Disabilities Have the Right to Live in the Community; Integration Tools for Children Must Be Included in California’s Olmstead Plan

Children with disabilities, like adults with disabilities, are disproportionately found in a variety of out-of-home settings (juvenile halls, foster care, residential treatment facilities, state hospitals) that segregate them from their families, friends, and social and vocational opportunities. Children with psychiatric disabilities are especially at risk of involvement in the juvenile justice or child welfare systems, repeated emergency psychiatric hospitalizations, graduation to the adult criminal justice system, a life of continued institutionalization and/or homelessness, and for many, suicide. However, the movement of children with disabilities away from these inevitabilities is not part of the Olmstead planning process of the majority of states, including California.

Children with disabilities can benefit from the same tools being explored for improving community integration of adults with disabilities. Home and community based waivers under the Medicaid program, for example, can be developed to address the needs of children who would not be eligible for Medicaid unless they were institutionalized. Such waivers would guarantee that eligible children would get the less costly, more effective, and preventative services that are needed to avoid institutionalization, or to transition out of more restrictive and less therapeutic environments. In fact, in order to compel California to seriously consider the use of a Medicaid Home and Community Based services waiver for children with psychiatric disabilities, PAI, along with other advocacy organizations, worked closely with Senator Deborah Ortiz to pass legislation that should require the state to conduct an analysis of the treatment improvements and cost savings that could be realized if a Medicaid Home and Community Based Services waiver were implemented in California. Pressure on the state to actually conduct this analysis and apply for the waiver will be one of the keys to ensuring real Olmstead implementation efforts are made for children in this state. Fully funding Children’s System of Care and Wraparound service delivery systems is also critical for making true treatment improvements and guaranteeing the availability of effective home and community based services for children with disabilities who are generally served by multiple agencies and unnecessarily removed from their homes.

http://www.olmsteadcommunity.org/Barriers2.pdf - dead link

http://www.bazelon.org/issues/children/publications/mergingsystems/olmsteadchildren2.pdf

http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/

http://saawww.ucsf.edu/csrgweb/index2b.html

http://www.cimh.org/downloads/Fostercaremanual.pdf - dead link