Category Archives: disability rights

Here Comes the Sun

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I heard a woman say, “The second my husband got his disability, he became a cottage industry.” Her observation was accurate when applied to her husband, and it is accurate when it is applied to thousands of people with disabilities across this country.

I say nothing new or profound when I point out that some companies that offer services to people with disabilities, people with brain injuries being the field I’m most familiar with, do their level best to keep people in their programs and enduring as many hours of services as possible in so the company profit. Is this true for all providers? Absolutely not. But it is true for some. And while providers who give their hearts and souls to help someone grow their independence and, in doing so, shed  services, deserve accolades and deserve the “headlines” so to speak, the ones who don’t, the ones who treat those of us with disabilities as if we are nothing more than profit makers, they deserve to be brought into the open. In a word, expose

Dehumanizing corruption like this thrives on secrecy. It hides behind a web of lies, overtures of feigned compassion spun with enormous skill, and, sometimes, no skill at all. Dehumanizing corruption like this is also bigotry. It’s prejudice. It’s as vile and hateful and full-throated as the racism that drove Selma Alabama racist Bull Connor in the 1960s to unleash police attack dogs and fire hoses and, in one instance, a small tank, on protesters, including women and children.

The denial of equal rights cannot continue. Bigotry of any kind has no seat at the table in a land pledged to freedom. If non-violent direct action is what it will take, then so be it. Too many good Americans have fought and given their lives so all of us can be free, not just a select, well-heeled few.

President Obama was right recently when said, “Sunshine is the best disinfectant.”

And so, with a smile and a nod the Beatles, let me just say, Here comes the sun.

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You Call Us Disabled…

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How can you say your helping human beings if you don’t think of them as human beings?

My name is Luther Willis and before I get goin’ here I just want to thank Mr. Peter Kahrmann for lettin’ me write this here piece in his blog.

We talked some and I said what I had to say and he smiled and said, “Have it it then,” and I’m damn glad he did ‘cause you might know he has this here bullet in his head and him goin’ off has different meanings, one’ve’m bein’ mighty messy.

Anyway, he said I could have it,  so I’m gonna do just that.

I live with what most folks call a disability but the specifics of it are of no never mind here. The thing is, lots of people call us disabled when most of those doin’ the callin’ are  bad disabled. I mean to say I can’t think of a disability much worse than a mind that can’t see a person’s humanity ‘cause maybe they have a brain injury, or can’t see or can’t walk, things like that. What’s worse is I see and seen people in powerful places makin’ all kindsa decisions about people they don’t see as human.

Might as well be slave owners

How can you say your helping human beings if you don’t think of them as human beings? Seems impossible. And people inflictin’ rules and regulations on the lives of people they don’t know are people. Might as well be slave owners, ‘cause there ain’t much of a difference.

Now I don’t ‘spect New York’s a helluva lot different than other places, though it would be mighty nice if it was. Here in New York you got a health department that has an advisory board it ‘spose to listen to about people livin’ with brain injuries and it does everything with that there advisory board but listen to’em. Then you got a state agency ‘spose to work with this here Independent Living Council and some times you got to wonder if what spills outta that agency ain’t just plain back stabbing schoolyard shit.

Anyway, maybe if people realized all people are people, things might just get better, for all of us. Now what’s so bad about that??

Thanks for readin’ my words.

Yours Truly,

Luther Willis

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NY State Department of Health Wounds Again

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Bad enough for 15 years the DOH either turned a blind eye or was too dysfunctional to  figure out that Tim Feeney, arguably, the most powerful person managing the Traumatic Brain Injury Waiver at the time, had bogus credentials and  was prancing around the state and beyond claiming he had a PhD and Masters Degree when didn’t. Now the DOH has issued a dangerous directive to companies providing services to brain injury survivors in New York that will prove devastating to the quality of life for many survivors and, not incidentally, is brutally unfair to some class-act providers across the state.

A couple of years back the DOH determined that providers offering home care staff needed to become licensed home care agencies. Many providers did just that, and some who are waiting on a response to their already-filed applications have been told, reportedly by a by-telephone directive from DOH employee Beth Gnozzio, they have 30 days to transfer their survivors to agencies that are already licensed home care agencies.

Never mind that these agencies lived up to their end of the bargain, never mind that survivors and families will suffer. Compassion and fairness are, in this and too many other instances, not on the menu for survivor, their families and those providers that are, in truth, honorable.

Follow the Money

This blog hopes that every survivor demands a fair hearing in response to this and, it would be interesting to follow the money. In other words, did any already-licensed home care agency contribute or give money in a way that prompted this decision?

The Second Victimization

This brutal directive is unfair to providers who’ve trained their staff and and lived up to their end of the filing for licensure process with the DOH. Worse still, it is brutal because it will mean the consumers, survivors like me, will suffer even more loss. They will lose relationships with people and agencies they have come to trust and rely on. In victimology, the treatment crime victims all too often experiences at the hands of the system is accurately called the second victimization, and so it is in this case.

Rumors Say Housing Subsidy at Risk

On top of this, rumors persist that the housing subsidy for those participating in the waiver is about to be cut, which would be devastating and likely keep people in or send people back to institutions and, in some cases, create homelessness.

Get Your Voices Heard

This blog is urging all interested parties to call and write to Beth Gnozzio and, perhaps more importantly, to call and write Deputy Commissioner Mark Kissinger.

Ms. Gnozzio can be reached at 518-486-4315. Her e-mail is mjg07@health.state.ny.us.

Mark Kissinger can be reached at 518-402-5673. His e-mail is mlk15@health.state.ny.us

And Remember

Your independence is only as strong as the independence of your neighbors.

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