Dianne Singletary credits the social worker who cares for her daughter, a toddler with cerebral palsy and a heart condition, with keeping her family functioning.
But a Patrick administration proposal that could cut off services for 10,000 young children and price out many more could force her, and others like her, to pay more for those services or lose them altogether.
“If this was your daughter, if this was your child, how would you feel?” Singletary said at a State House rally Monday. “[Gov. Deval Patrick] has to walk in our shoes. Come to my home in Dorchester and see what my life is like every day.”
Singletary was one of hundreds of parents and supporters of so-called early intervention programs – those that help newborns to four-year-olds with developmental disabilities and delays to walk, talk and learn at their age-level – who crowded the hallways outside the governor’s office, with strollers and children in tow. The administration has proposed hiking fees for some parents to $800 from $60 a year, with similar fee increases for others, depending on their income, prompting Monday’s wave of protesters.
Their demands: withdraw the proposed rule changes and fee hikes to early intervention programs, find $2 million to close a projected deficit in the programs’ funding this year, and work with parents to find a solution for a projected $10 million gap next fiscal year. The $2 million for this year’s budget must be allocated by April 1, say backers of the services, or else the fee hikes will have to be implemented.
“If I lose my social worker that comes out to my house every week, I’m losing something big,” Singletary said at the rally. “We are not going to suffer. We are going to fight the governor. We are going to fight everyone to keep early intervention. If we don’t advocate for our children, no one will advocate for our children.”
Her plea was accentuated by the cries and giggling of toddlers carted around by parents in strollers to help drive home their point. After they rallied, the parents dispersed to bring their message to lawmakers.
Funded at $25.6 million this fiscal year, early intervention systems were lumped into a $38.9 million account for children’s “health and nutrition” in Patrick’s fiscal 2011 budget proposal. That account also funds women, infants and children’s nutrition services, hearing screenings for newborns and pediatric palliative care.
Early intervention spending took deep cut this year, falling from a high of $41.5 million expended in fiscal 2009.
Patrick’s public health commissioner, John Auerbach, told the News Service that early intervention programs are under strain as a result of ballooning enrollment amid the down economy.
The Department of Public Health has proposed tightening standards of eligibility, which would eliminate services for 10,000 of the 30,000 children in early intervention programs, and raising fees for parents earning more than three times the poverty level – $22,050 for a family of four.
The rally was billed as a boycott of administration hearings on the proposed changes.
Representing the Patrick administration, Auerbach, who listened to the protesters, offered words of solace to attendees and drew applause when he said the proposals were a “last resort.”
Auerbach told the News Service that because early intervention services are partly funded by the federal government, the state is required to propose budget fixes and hold hearings on them, but is not required to implement the fixes. DPH held hearings Monday morning and last Thursday.
“When there are possibilities that we’re going to run a shortfall, we have to hold hearings, and we have to put out possible steps that would be taken. As the governor has said, this is not currently the position of the administration. They would be an absolute last resort and something we hope doesn’t happen,” Auerbach told protesters. “The administration has protected the funding against cutbacks. We are still doing our best to try and determine if there are different options.”
Under the DPH proposal, families earning between 300 and 400 percent of the federal poverty level would see per-child fees rise to $800 from $60 a year; those earning between four and 5.5 times the federal poverty level would be charged $1,200, up from $180 a year; those earning between 5.5 and 7.5 times the federal poverty level would see fees rise from $350 to $2,500 a year; and those earning more than 7.5 times the federal poverty level would see fees climb to $3,500 a year from $500.
More than half of the 30,000 children in early intervention programs wouldn't be subject to a fee hike because their parents earn less than three times the federal poverty level and pay no fees.
Mary Ann Mulligan, the legislative consultant for the Massachusetts Early Intervention Consortium, said the proposed eligibility rules would require, for example, that a two-year-old have a one-year-old’s language capacity in order to be considered for services – the ability to speak no more than two words.
Mulligan said, “The two words that I and my husband and I wanted to hear most were ‘mama’ and ‘dada,’ Mulligan said. “Those two words would make that two year old ineligible.”
