When state legislators pushed through a $22.6 billion budget last Wednesday night — after nearly five months of delay — the end result spelled devastation for many social services. For advocates of the mentally retarded, it dealt an especially hard blow. The legislative budget fails to include one penny of the $22 million originally set aside to provide housing and support services to mentally retarded adults now languishing on lengthy waiting lists (see "The Waiting Game," News and Features, September 22, 2000). That money was mandated for that purpose by a legal settlement that the state reached with thousands of families last December.

Advocates remain shell-shocked. "It just never occurred to me that this would happen," admits Neil McKittrick, the Boston-based Hill & Barlow attorney who won the families’ class-action lawsuit (Boulet v. Cellucci) last year. The settlement resulted from a July 14, 2000 ruling, in which US District Court judge Douglas Woodlock ordered all mentally retarded adults eligible for the federal Medicaid program in Massachusetts to be taken off the state’s waiting list and offered housing and support services within 90 days. For months thereafter, McKittrick and state officials hashed out a court-approved agreement, which requires the administration to spend $114 million over the next five years to move as many as 2225 people off the list.

"We all agreed this was a reasonable settlement," McKittrick adds. "Now the legislature is choosing to ignore the good work that was done."

But lawmakers haven’t simply slashed the money for the Boulet settlement. They’ve also cut $37.6 million from the Department of Mental Retardation’s existing budget — for programs like respite care, transportation, and job training for mentally retarded adults and their families. The DMR estimates that, if the cuts prove final, more than 7800 people who currently receive such services will have to do without them come January.

As if things at the DMR weren’t bad enough, the decision to eliminate the Boulet appropriation could mean more legal action. McKittrick is careful to note that the failure to appropriate money for the Boulet settlement doesn’t automatically place the state in violation of its legal agreement. If the DMR were to meet its obligations — that is, placing 325 people in residential-housing programs while offering interim support services to another 1925 families remaining on the waiting list this year — the cuts would be a non-issue. But that doesn’t seem likely.

In a November 26 statement, DMR commissioner Gerald Morrissey called the latest overall reductions "painful, disturbing, and unnecessary," and referred to the Boulet omission in particular as "a problem on many levels." Since the fiscal year began in July, the DMR has already allocated $9.8 million of the promised $22 million for residential housing to serve 84 of the 325 people. Because the DMR doesn’t have an extra $9.8 million in its coffers, Morrissey expects those people to lose their long-awaited services. In other words, they’ll be sent back to their parents’ homes. He adds, "Eliminating this appropriation will result in further costly litigation in federal court." McKittrick, not surprisingly, agrees: "If the DMR cannot pay for services to which it agreed, we will end up back in front of the judge."

Legal experts say such a violation could have serious consequences. If the administration fails to eliminate the waiting list, plaintiffs can reopen their lawsuit to compel the state to do so. If services still aren’t provided, they can move to hold the state in contempt of court. That means Judge Woodlock could do anything from imposing fines on the state to appointing a "special master" to overhaul the DMR system (as has happened with state hospitals and prisons). In short, the agreement is no joke.

But all that could take years. Meanwhile, advocates aren’t ready to give up just yet. Last Wednesday, Leo Sarkissian, who heads the advocacy group Arc Massachusetts (formerly the Massachusetts Association for Retarded Citizens), was among the first to sound the alarm on Beacon Hill about the DMR cuts. He and his colleagues have since kept busy lobbying the House and Senate leadership. They’ve visited aides of Governor Jane Swift, who has until December 5 to respond to the legislature’s budget with her own supplemental version. This Monday afternoon, Sarkissian and hundreds of others intend to stage a protest at the State House to demand that the governor and legislators support a revised fiscal plan that includes — at the very least — money for Boulet. So for now, Sarkissian says, "we’re hopeful for something that looks better. It isn’t over."

Indeed. Not when legal recourse exists. Says McKittrick, "Elimination of these funds will come down to wasted money, time, and effort for the state. More litigation isn’t going to change what the judge has already ordered."

Issue Date: November 29 - December 6, 2001

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