Friday, April 24, 2009
In an ideal world, there’d be no need for a place like the Mexia State School. All children would be healthy and whole, and they would grow to adulthood that way. This isn’t an ideal world.
OK, then: In a close-to-ideal world in which children have severe mental and physical disabilities, we’d have the resources to tend to them all in their homes or in intimate settings connected with their communities. We don’t have that world, either.
So, we need — and will continue to need — places like the Mexia State School. These institutions can have their problems such as those alarming ones confirmed by state investigations: stretched staff being neglectful, and some poorly chosen staffers being reckless and abusive. Texas needs a heightened investment in staff and better oversight.
As serious as these revelations are, they don’t in any way merit an overreaction that shuts down state schools. The problems call for giving them the resources to do what’s best.
A bill gaining traction in Austin is such an overreaction. It would close state schools — which ones we can’t know — in favor of community-based solutions like group homes.
Some parents of state school clients convincingly urge against this.
Those parents are satisfied with where their severely disabled children have been long-term residents. They know that the expense of providing for those individuals in group homes is prohibitive. And Texas has never been one to spend freely.
Consider unto itself the space that a group home would need to deal with the equipment that transports an individual like Mexia State School resident Julie Browder, daughter of Frank and Jacque Beavers of China Spring. She must be transported out of her bed with a lift. Hallways must be wide to get her to therapy. The Beavers say Mexia State School, her home of 33 years, is the best place for her. Who in Austin is fit to say it is not?
The Beavers agree that some of the people in state schools would be well-served in community-based residences. But those places don’t offer the round-the-clock supervision required for some people under the state’s care.
It would be reasonable and commendable, based on the desires on individual families, to move more clients into community care. If demand dictates and more clients are so relocated, state schools can and should be downsized.
That doesn’t mean we close state schools, though. The Beavers’ daughter shouldn’t have to go anywhere after all these years. It’s her home. They tended to her at their home for 12 years until it became too onerous. Mexia State School was the place to which her parents turned in a not-ideal world.
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