Vanessa West was understandably overwhelmed when she found out that
her newborn daughter, Arianna, was born with a heart defect, lung
disease, a compromised immune system and other serious problems.
“It was so many tests; it was so many procedures,” she said.
Now at age 2, Arianna has an occupational and speech therapist, as
well as physical therapists who were assigned to help her improve her
motor skills following heart surgery at 6 months old.
Despite all of this, West said she is lucky. Yes, lucky: Through the
Arizona Early Intervention Program (AzEIP), Arianna was able to receive
special-needs services from the state.
“I knew with this program, she was going to get all the help she
needed,” West said.
However, West found out from her state-service coordinator earlier
this year that the services that she and Arianna have greatly relied
upon were going to be discontinued, thanks to state budget cuts.
“It definitely freaked me out,” she said. “They helped me so much
… It’s because of these services that (Arianna) is doing so well. It
was disbelief.”
Almost 3,100 families received letters from the Department of
Economic Security at the time alerting them that special-needs services
for their children would be reduced or discontinued due to the state
budget cuts announced in February.
The cuts were the direct result of efforts the state Legislature and
Gov. Jan Brewer made to balance the budget for the fiscal year which
ends on June 30.
In response to the cuts, the Arizona Center for Disability Law, a
nonprofit public-interest legal agency, filed a class-action lawsuit on
April 15 against the Department of Economic Security, claiming that the
state was discontinuing mandatory services in violation of state and
federal laws, as well as the United States Constitution.
“We feel these are very essential services required by law. … The
state of Arizona has taken a pretty radical step by cutting these
services,” said Center for Disability Law Attorney J.J. Rico, one of
the two lead lawyers in the case, at the time.
The second lead attorney, JoAnn Sheperd, added: “We feel these
children are being unlawfully denied services that are an
entitlement.”
AzEIP is a statewide program which provides support and services to
families with children up to the age of 3 with developmental delays or
disabilities such as autism and cerebral palsy.
The program was in line with the federal Individuals With
Disabilities Education Act, which requires the state to provide
early-intervention services that will allow children the opportunity to
reach the level of their peers and/or learn to adapt to their
disability. The goals are to avoid possible institutionalization and
reduce the costs to the education system in the future. Every state in
the country provides these services, according to the Arizona Center
for Disability Law.
After the center filed the lawsuit, the state did a turnaround and
re-established funding for AzEIP through June 30. What happens after
that depends on the new state budget that legislators and the governor
are currently haggling over.
“What happens after June 30, we don’t know, and the state has put
before the court (that) they don’t know, either,” Rico said.
However, Rico said that not all clients are receiving full services.
One child in particular, he said, only receives speech therapy once a
month, although she needs this service more often.
Rico’s lawsuit remains in a holding pattern until the state releases
its new budget.
“Our hope is that the Legislature funds early-intervention services
like they are federally obligated to do,” he said.
The center is representing three clients as part of the current
lawsuit, but Rico said his office has received more than 20 calls from
concerned parents about how to handle possible AzEIP cuts.
“If you don’t (offer early-intervention services) now, the state
will have to pay for it later. The goal of these services is to assist
them now,” Rico said.
Meanwhile, Vanessa West, who assists at a support center for
children with congenital heart disease called Mended Little Hearts of
Tucson, said her decision to be represented in the lawsuit was not
hard.
“It was something that I wanted to get involved in,” she explained.
“It was kind of scary. … (But) I believe with all my heart that
someone needs to step up and do something, and after the initial fear
of, ‘It’s a lawsuit,’ I was all for it,” she said.
West remains concerned about the potential loss of services.
“My first thought was: What about all the children who are going to
be born that aren’t going to have the advantages that my daughter did?”
she said. “I can’t believe kids aren’t going to have that
opportunity.”
Mari Herreras contributed to this story.
This article appears in Jun 4-10, 2009.
Why is it that every child who needs aide or help with medical care always suffers? Governments or states feel that is the most likely place to get money and by doing so look who suffers. It is about time that we as a country need to be looking at our congressman and senators. We sent them to their posts by voting them into office and they promised to go and work for the people. That is you and I, and I think that if they can’t do the job then we need to look at doing recalls and letting someone else go and work at putting some of these issues in order. Children should not be made to suffer because people want the money for some other pie in the sky ideas. Between you and me, our kids are taking the short end of the stick, and they are not getting a good education nor good help from anyone who can make their lives better.