Kansans with intellectual and developmental disabilities made front page news today as reporting of the Capitol rally spread through local media. Along with articles from news outlets such as the Topeka Capitol Journal, KHI News, Wichita Eagle (video below) to name a few, the Lawrence Journal World took the 2015 InterHab Push Day Rally to the front page of it's print newspaper (article below).
Hundreds rally at statehouse to support social services
TOPEKA - Hundreds of disabled individuals, along with their families and their advocates, rallied at the Statehouse on Thursday to call for full funding of social services that they rely on to continue living independently.
Many of those attending were people with physical and developmental disabilities that are so severe they qualify under Medicaid to live in nursing homes or other long-term care facilities. But with certain kinds of non-medical assistance known as “home and community based services,” they are able to live on their own or with their families. Those services include things like help with personal hygiene, house cleaning, and monitoring a person’s sleep and medication.
Although Kansas lawmkers have not yet proposed cuts to those services — in fact, the state’s total social services budget is expected to grow by $138 million — advocates for those individuals say they worry that cuts could be right around the corner as lawmakers grapple with trying to fill a $422 million budget hole for next year.
“When we see looming problems in achieving a tax package that could pay the bills, one of the things you have to think about is where they can cut,” said Tom Laing, executive director of Interhab, a Topeka-based organization that advocates for the rights of people with developmental disabilities. “And with Medicaid being such a big chunk of the budget, we don’t want to see them balancing the budget on the backs of Medicaid.”...
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Photo by Nick Krug. Lawrence resident Rachel Blann, right, hugs her facilitator,
Roxana Covarrubias, of Lawrence, during a rally for those protesting potential
cuts to disability services, Thursday, April 30, 2015, on the south side of the
Kansas Statehouse in Topeka. Several hundred Kansans with disabilities and
advocates for disability services went to the Capitol to speak with lawmakers,
who are in the middle of attempting to balance the state budget.
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