Virginia Still Is Playing Catch-Up in Disability-Rights Arena

On June 22, 1999, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its landmark decision in Olmstead v. L.C. Let's all take a minute tomorrow and celebrate the 10-year anniversary of a monumental but little-known breakthrough in the recognition of rights of people with disabilities.

In Olmstead the court stated in sweeping language and with broad application that people with disabilities enjoy the civil right to live, work, move about, play, and just pursue enjoyment of life in community settings, to the greatest extent possible and with appropriate supports and accommodations.

The Olmstead decision has been referred to as a "community integration" mandate, based in Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). According to the Virginia Office of Community Integration for People with Disabilities, this mandate "requires that people with disabilities be able to live in the setting in which they can interact to the maximum extent possible with people who do not have disabilities."

When Olmstead was first decided, disabilities-rights groups and direct service providers likened this legal development to a Brown v. Board of Education for people with disabilities. Understandably so. The Olmstead court took the unusual step of speaking, not just to the case before it, but directly to all those who might have responsibilities to ensure compliance with the ADA.

The word went out in Olmstead: Break down the barriers -- both physical and systemic -- that keep people with disabilities unduly and unnecessarily isolated from the community at large. But has that message really hit home throughout Virginia?

There are good efforts underway, of course. Information provided at Virginia's Olmstead Project Web site (http://www.olmsteadva.com) gives an overview of the state's response and its efforts to implement the community integration mandate.

Realize, though, that Virginia is playing a catch-up game on its responsibilities under the ADA, and it is not really winning. In 2000, right after the Olmstead decision, Virginia was found to rank 50th out of 51 jurisdictions (including D.C.) in its allocation of spending toward community-based services and settings, as opposed to institutional services and settings. Only Mississippi ranked worse.

THIS FIGURE IS taken from a nationally recognized study, State of the States in Developmental Disabilities. This study was most recently updated in 2008, and while Virginia has moved up a few positions in the rankings, it still lags behind most other states in its allocation of spending toward community-based services and settings. Too much money and political capital remains invested in the state's intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) institutions.

So where is Virginia 10 years after Olmstead? That is a question worth asking, but it is a question that really should not have to be asked in the first place. The state should be broadcasting its efforts under the community integration mandate so all Virginians know about their rights and what the state is doing to protect them.

Olmstead is a decision that has stayed in the shadows, cloaked in a bureaucratic response, for too long. People need to know their rights in order to assert them effectively.

Three years ago, at the Positive Vibe Cafe's VibeFest, I did a fairly thorough but unofficial survey of the people in attendance, asking whether people were aware of the Olmstead decision and its community integration mandate. I tried to concentrate particularly on families attending with their children with disabilities. I was hard-pressed to find anybody -- other than the state agency representatives who attended -- who knew anything about the decision.

FOR THE RECORD, there is no better explanation of the Olmstead decision and its far-reaching implications than that given by Gov. Tim Kaine, in his statement released through the Office of Community Integration for people with Disabilities:

"Each Virginian with a disability deserves to enjoy the same benefits of society and freedoms of everyday life that Virginians without disabilities enjoy. The commonwealth has an obligation under the U.S. Supreme Court's Olmstead v. L.C. decision, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the Virginians with Disabilities Act to provide opportunities for people with disabilities who choose to do so to become fully integrated into the community."

Ten years after the Olmstead decision, we owe it to people with disabilities to recommit and redouble our efforts to ensure their rights to community integration, so these words ring true throughout Virginia.

Let's start by getting Creigh Deeds and Bob McDonnell to commit, in the course of the gubernatorial campaign, to do all they can to make the promise of Olmstead a reality in the commonwealth.

Then let's do all that we can as members of our own communities. That's where real progress will be made.
Mike Sarahan is the father of a 21-year-old son with significant disabilities.