On behalf of the National Association of Coordinators of State We trust that you and your fellow Subcommittee members will find our testimony useful in your deliberations on the bill. If we can be of further assistance, please feel free to call IMMEDIATE PAST PRESIDENT BARNETT PMD CONRAD R. WURTI PH.D DES MOINES TOWA STATEMENT OF TESTIMONY ON VOCATIONAL REHABILITATION AMENDMENTS OF 1972 Respectfully Submitted to the SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE HANDICAPPED The Honorable Jennings Randolph, Chairman by David B. Ray, Jr., Legislative Chairman NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF COORDINATORS OF STATE PROGRAMS FOR THE MENTALLY RETARDED, INC. June 6, 1972 The National Association of Coordinators of State Programs for the cance. During the current fiscal year the Rehabilitation Services Administration predicts that some 43,700 mentally retarded individuals will be placed in jobs through the federal-state vocational rehabilitation program. This figure would constitute a seven fold increase in the number of retarded persons rehabilitated since FY 1963. However, despite this commendable progress, there is little reason for complacency. The President's Committee on Mental Retardation has estimated that close to two million retarded adolescents and adults remain in need of rehabilitation services. For this reason, the members of our Association are vitally concerned with the extension and improvement of programs authorized under the Vocational Rehabilitation Act. On behalf of the Association we wish to strongly endorse the Housepassed version of H.R. 8395. The managers of the legislation in the House deserve our warm commendation for their perceptive and forwardlooking action on the bill. Clearly it contains many important new breakthroughs for hundreds of thousands of handicapped Americans. At the same time, we would like to suggest to the Subcommittee a number of ways in which the House's action might be clarified and strenghtened. In most instances, the amendments we recommend will simply translate into statuatory law positions expressed by the House Committee in its report on the legislation. A. Rehabilitation of Severely Handicapped Individuals. One of the most praiseworthy and potentially far-reaching features of the House version of H. R. 8395 is the provisions dealing with severely handicapped clients. In its report on the legislation, the House Committee expressed grave concern about the apparent inability of rehabilitation agencies to serve individuals suffering from severe disabilities and directed HEW and state rehabilitation agencies to give greater attention to this objective. The Committee also added a new Title III to the bill which authorizes grants to the states to help in serving severely handicapped persons who presently would not be considered suitable candidates for rehabilitation vices. ser As the representative of state agencies which are responsible for providing services to over 200,000 institutionalized retarded individuals and many thousands more severely disabled children and adults in community settings, we are concerned about the lack of training and long term sheltered employment opportunities for severely handicapped adults. Often such services can spell the difference between a life of total dependency in an institutional setting and a semi-independent, normalized living situation in the community. In fact, there are literally thousands of moderately to severely retarded adolescents and adults currently residing in state institutions who could live a happier more rewarding life if adequate, work oriented programs and supervisory living arrangements were available in the community. For example, a recent, indepth analysis of the resident population of New York State schools for the retarded concluded that fully one-quarter of the 27,000 residents could be cared for more appropriately outside the institution if only these other services were available in local communities. Despite recent improvements in the Act (such as provisions for extended evaluation of work potential) the single objective of the federal-state rehabilitation program remains to help handicapped persons achieve economic independence. No one could argue with this noble aim. In fact, over the past decade some 200,000 retarded primarily mildly afflicted individuals have been placed in jobs through the efforts of state rehabilitation agencies. Nonetheless, we are concerned that many seriously disabled individuals with work potential are not being served by the rehabilitation progaam because of the overriding emphasis on serving clients who are "feasible" candidates for placement in competitive industry. adults In many instances, complete economic independence may not be a realistic goal for the seriously afflicted individual. They may require long term or even lifetime placement in a sheltered workshop, work activity center or some other type of semi-protected work environment. Nonetheless, we would argue that every individual regardless of the severity of his handicap has a right to hold a job which is commensurate with his abilities. In addition, many studies have demonstrated the sharp improvements in social adaptation of handicapped persons which occur once they are employed. Offering severely handicapped individuals an opportunity to work not only confers an imprimatur of dignity in our workoriented society but also saves the American taxpayers money since it is considerably more expensive to maintain such individuals in a state or private residential institution. Reliable estimates indicate that the cost of providing lifetime care for a retarded individual in a state residential facility runs at least $200,000. Title III of the House-passed bill constitutes an important departure from existing law; under this program, for the first time, services could be offered to a client even though he or she was found to be too disabled for placement in gainful employment. The language of the House Committee report explicitly points out that Title III funds should be used to expand and improve services to severely disabled persons working in sheltered employment. We are delighted by the House Committee's recognition of the great need in this area and would urge this Subcommittee to reiterate this point so that the legislative intent of Congress will be crystal clear. Although NACSPMR strongly supports the House's action in regard to the severely handicapped, we do feel that there are several steps which this Subcommittee might take to reinforce and strengthen the legislative intent of the House: First, we favor the addition of language to Titles I and II of the bill which would grant severely handicapped clients priority in the receipt of services. During the course of House hearings on the legislation, convincing testimony was presented concerning the existing barriers to the delivery of high quality rehabilitation services to severely handicapped clients. In response to this testimony the House Committee in its report directed HEW "to explore in depth and to develop appropriate measures to reach those who have the most severe physical or mental handicaps." We enthusiastically support this objective; however, given the significant adjustments which will be required on the part of state and local rehabilitation agencies, we believe that specific statutory language should be included in the Act granting service priority to individuals with the most severe disabilities. Recent research on the vocational training of the mentally retarded indicates that we may be grossly underestimating the capacity of severely disabled persons to perform successfully in work situations. A team of investigators from the Children's Research Center at the University of Illinois recently demonstrated that sixty-four moderately to severely retarded individuals could be taught to perform complex industrial assembly tasks in an amazingly short period of time through the use of intensive, carefully planned training techniques. Principle investigator Dr. Marc W. Gold concludes that "the field of the habilitation of the mentally retarded. today in the United States. exists within a context where the population with whom it deals is perceived by almost everyone as being far less capable than is really the case. The clear implication of this research is that the low expectancy levels of parents and professionals alike and the failure of rehabilitation agencies to to adopt modern industrial training techniques are among the major factors limiting the placement of severely disabled retarded clients in highly productive jobs. Second, we recommend that the provisions contained in Title III of the House-passed bill be transferred to Part B of Title I in order to emphasize the relationship between the basic grant program and the new section on the severely handicapped. The House did not intend Title III as a substitute for state efforts to rehabilitate the severely disabled under the basic federal-state rehabilitation program. As the House Committee pointed out in its report on the legislation, "Title III is designed to supplement, but not replace Title I. Title III should not be viewed as a. . 'dumping ground' for difficult cases which may arise." We share the House Committee's concern that services to the severely handicapped not be segregated or compartmentalized and, therefore, suggests that both the basic federal-state program and the new formula grant program for the severely handicapped be subsumed under the same title of the Act. Third, we recommend that the present Title III program be viewed as a supplemental rather than a comprehensive grant program i.e. funding under Title III should be limited to those services to severely disabled clients which clearly can not be paid for out of |