COFAR blog

It’s hard to figure out what to make of the administration’s spending decisions when it comes to providing services to people with intellectual disabilities in Massachusetts.

On the one hand, since Fiscal Year 2009, the administration and Legislature have cut most community-based line items, including adult family supports (26.9% cut), community transportation (17.6%), community day and work (3.8%), Turning 22 (35%).

Not suprisingly, the developmental centers line item in the budget has been cut since FY 09 by $45.4 million, or 24.2%.  (In fact, based on a set of numbers provided by the Department of Developmental Services, the budgets of the Templeton, Monson, and Glavin developmental centers alone were cut by almost 70 percent between FY 09 and FY 11.)

Yet, at the same time, the community residential line item (which funds contract-based care in privately operated group homes) has been raised since FY 09 by $182.2 million, or 32%.  In addition, the state-operated group home line item has been boosted by $27.4 million, or 19.9 percent, in that time.

 These two community residential and state-operated group home line items have been boosted by a total of $209.6 million, while the cuts have totaled $87.4 million during the same period (not counting the planned phase-out of funding under the Boulet lawsuit).   The bottom line is the grand total of all DDS line items is $34.6 million higher in the current fiscal year than it was in FY 09.

What exactly has been going on here?  We’ve asked DDS for information on where residents of the developmental centers targeted for closure have been transferred.  We don’t believe very many residents have opted to live in privately operated group homes.  So it remains a mystery to us just why the administration has needed to boost the community-residential line item by more than $180 million.

It’s true there are potentially thousands of people waiting for community-based residential care.  But if indeed more than $180 million in new state dollars have been put toward accomodating people waiting for residential services, why has the administration been cutting funds for transportation, day programs, family support, Turning 22 and other programs for those same people?  

It would seem that had the administration pared back the increase in the community residential line item to a modest $100 million increase since FY 2009, they could have prevented the cuts in the other community line items at at least held them harmless.  It’s strange because the administration’s funding decisions have left it open to the charge from the Association of Developmental Disabilities Providers that the administration has failed to back its “professed interest in Community First,”  an initiative intended to boost community-based services choices and spending. 

In the meantime, DDS has denied a request by COFAR for records detailing community-based costs of a particular community-based residential program.  We’ve been seeking to compare costs and services under this particular contract with the budgets of the Templeton, Monson, and Glavin Centers from FY 2009 to the present. (We don’t believe that the cuts in the developmental center budgets will save money in the long run because these same services must be funded in community-based accounts if they aren’t funded under the developmental center budgets.)

We asked for both a breakdown of the Templeton, Monson, and Glavin budgets and records detailing the costs of medical, nursing, clinical, and therapeutic services provided to residents of the group home program.  In a letter dated October 23, DDS’s general counsel stated that the documents we requested concerning the group home program are part of DDS clients’ records and are therefore exempt from disclosure.

COFAR has appealed the denial to the state Division of Public Records, arguing that we are not seeking information that identifies any specific individuals.  What we want to find out is which agency or agencies both fund and provide the medical, nursing, clinical, and therapeutic services under this contract, and how much these services cost state taxpayers in total. 

We believe DDS can provide the information we are seeking without violating the privacy rights of the individuals in this program.  Should DDS refuse to provide this information, the public will have no way of knowing basic details about the provision and cost of these kinds of public services.