Day 14 and He is not tolerating jail very well any more. Every one from the Attorney, the prosecutor, the jail staff, (and from what I have heard, the judge) are on the same page on keeping a boy with Special needs, and limited intellectual capacity, in jail....The main problem is that DDD can not find any community beds. The State has an excuative stop order on all Developmental Center admissions, as well as out of state placements, so he can not go back to Woods. I think the state is starting to recognize that Autism and other develomental Disabilities are not a ....One Size Fits All group of kids. The community placement rule is having the biggest negative impact on the dually diagnosed (Mental Health & Medically fragile autistic kids)....Given the current situation, someone at the top needs to realize the servere negative impact this is having on this young man, and do the right thing, and open a bed at the Huntedon Developmental Center, or Woods. Continuing beyond day 14 of housing an intellectually disabled autistic man in the county jail is not an appropriate substitution for Community care. If NJ can not move forward with the Community only care, we need to take a step back, and make things right for Tyler. Jail....is not an option or a substitution for appropriate autism residential housing. I am hoping that Governor Christi hears this, and makes a few calls to help us out, being he is such a strong advocate for Autism. Day 14, and we are in Dire Straights.....I have a very solid, autism community action plan I would love to share with the Governors office.It offers so many things that the communities need to address to keep the ID/DD folks safe with in the communities! It would address many of the current problems, and is fiscally conservative. Its a win-win...but we need help now!
Posted on: Wed, 01 Oct 2014 20:17:15 +0000
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