A system ripe with corruption
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November 03, 2009
The current mental health care system is ripe with corruption, and there are multiple layers in place to protect it. This is a system that allows staggering numbers of abuse of disabled children and adults to continue. The former Governor, along with Governor David Paterson ran their incredibly successful campaign telling all people in New York that they were going to deal with corruption within State government, and bring transparency. Unfortunately, they have not fulfilled those promises made to us yet. The major systemic problems within the current mental health care system are an extremely important example. Most of the same problems of corruption and lack of true transparency still remain within the mental health care system to date. The current system is allowing thousands of people with disabilities to continue to be abused, and in most cases their abuse is not even reported to the police for investigation. Many calls of physical and sexual abuse of the disabled to the state hotline are never reported to the police, and therefore many people are never held accountable by law for their actions, and are often left in their positions to repeatedly abuse the same individual, or others. Currently, even if the abuse is reported to the state hotline, the facility where the abuse occurred has the authority to make the determination of whether or not the police are contacted. This is clearly an outrageous conflict of interest. Also, many statewide agencies, both state and private, conduct their own internal investigations of abuse, which is also a huge conflict of interest because facilities have a powerful desire to conceal abuse of their consumers to protect themselves.
Rampant abuse of disabled people continues because of the failure to address the roots of these problems. There are currently between 13,000-14,000 calls of alleged abuse of the disabled to the state hotline annually, according to OMRDD statistics. Abuse must be stopped, and innocent victims such as the disabled must be protected from ongoing abuse and harm. The current mental health care system is not transparent, nor is there a desire to change and become transparent. OMRDD and the CQC have resisted all common sense areas of reform to protect people with disabilities statewide. Governor Paterson must not allow their gross negligence of responsibility to continue. One of the biggest problems is that people are not being told the truth, and important information is often kept from families that need to make informed decisions for what is best for their disabled loved one.
In our case, my wife and I were never informed that the Anderson School, now called the Anderson Center for Autism, which is located in Staatsburg, New York, had the highest number of indications (substantiated, proven) cases of child abuse of all OMRDD certified facilities in 2002-2003. There are approximately 6000 OMRDD certified facilities statewide, and 73% of the indicated cases of abuse were at Anderson in 2002-2003, just before we enrolled Jonathan there. We were never made aware of these facts. A state document dated April 2004 from the CQC to OMRDD reveals these facts, yet we were never made aware of them, and then Jonathan was severely abused at the Anderson School shortly after. According to the memorandum, it stated, "Our indication rate of 23% of all Anderson School cases is nearly four times the overall indication rate for both OMH and OMRDD facilities and Anderson accounts for a staggering 73% of all indications for OMRDD certified facilities." We later obtained this information from the New York State Inspector General's Office through FOIL, only after my son Jonathan was killed by his caregiver, Jonathan's Law was passed, and an extensive investigation of his abuse was done by the NYS Inspector General's Office. Now we have learned the truth, but it is too late for Jonathan, and for us. This interoffice memorandum between the CQC and OMRDD reveals that both of these agencies had full knowledge of ongoing serious problems of child abuse at the Anderson School, yet both agencies failed to properly deal with Anderson and the people involved with the abuses, and instead chose to conceal what was happening there from us and the general public. The information was possibly not even made known to the New York State Education Department, which licenses the school. Lack of transparency allows abuse and such corruption to breed. Clearly, if we had known the truth that the Anderson School had the highest number of indicated cases of child abuse in the entire state, we absolutely never would have enrolled our son Jonathan there.
Three years of OMRDD statics reveal a staggering number of calls of alleged abuse of the disabled to the abuse hotline located in Menands, New York, totaling almost 40,000. These are only the reported cases, and sources within both state and private facilities say this is only a fraction of the abuse actually happening. The failure of state agencies to properly protect the disabled in New York is incomprehensible. Insufficient background checks and poor hiring practices are the beginning of the problems. Background checks and hiring practices are much more thorough for corrections officers, including drug testing and a basic psychological test. These must be put in place to protect vulnerable disabled people too. Caregivers deserve to be paid a fair wage for their hard hands on work with disabled people every day. Because of the current improper hiring practices and a poor pay scale, there are numerous problems and systemic abuse. There is also insufficient supervision, lack of surveillance cameras, poor disciplinary practices, corrupt internal investigations, lack of police notification, and concealing as much information as possible from parents or guardians. Therefore, you have a system which is clearly ripe with corruption. Unless Governor Paterson uses his authority to put a stop to this corruption and seriously deal with these problems, it will surely continue. Governor Paterson asked me personally to meet with Dianna Jones Ritter, Commissioner of OMRDD, earlier this year, to address these core problems. Unfortunately, I was again met with only direct opposition, and therefore, the systemic abuse continues.
This is a gross injustice which is jeopardizing the lives of countless children and adults with disabilities statewide. I have addressed these issues with the Governor, including ways to make the system much safer, provide better services, increase jobs, and potentially save hundreds millions of dollars annually, yet dozens of my letters go unanswered. The failures of the current commissioners are catastrophic, and they are obstinate to critical changes and to do what is right and just. I cannot understand how these injustices have been allowed to continue for so long, especially since I have repeatedly brought these issues to the forefront for years now. I cannot help but speak louder and clearer. Many of the conscientious employees are being punished and even fired for reporting abuse. This is wrong, and we desperately need the best of people working with all people with disabilities, and to remove the bad apples. It is time for Governor Paterson to make things right in many ways, and work with me and the other legislative leaders to reform the current extremely dangerous mental health care system to make it truly safe, transparent, and accountable. It will take honesty to admit that there are major systemic failures, and then courage to make the necessary changes in leadership, policies, and laws. But that is what good leaders do. I believe Governor Paterson can lead in true reform by honoring his campaign promises to deal with corruption and bring about transparency, honoring his words to get back to serving the people, and by honoring his oath and vow to uphold the constitution, which promises equal rights and equal protection to all residents, which includes everyone with a disability.
Michael Carey
Bethlehem
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