Epileptic and special needs patients lose their home

A date has been set for the closing of the Fort Wayne State Developmental Center.
Today's announcement has huge ramifications for patients and the center's employees.
Come July 2007, all the developmentally disabled patients at the center will have to be moved into a different living arrangement.

It's being sold as a cheaper, more effective way to care for those patients, with a significant negative impact on jobs for this area.

The roughly 1,000 employees on the payroll are guaranteed jobs for about five months, and then all positions will be phased out through June of 2007.

The decision was no shock to employee Christopher Brown, who says, "They've been talking about it for probably months to almost years, so, so it's just one of those things that was inevitable."
Employee Greg Lewis says, "They have to do what they have to do, they are trying to save money and they have to do what they have to do."

The center cared for 679 patients in 1987, the number now…208.

Nearly all of the remaining patients, quite a number of whom are profoundly developmentally disabled, will be moved to homes or apartments where they're supposed to get more personalized attention.

The State Developmental Center has a history of patients being abused and neglected…the Secretary of Family and Social Services referring to it as a checkered past.

But Mitch Roob made it clear, that's not why this place is being closed, that it's about cost savings and better client care.

It costs taxpayers 860 dollars per day, per patient to house someone here, and between 150 and 400 dollars a day to serve them in group homes or assisted living settings.

This woman's daughter, who suffers from epileptic seizures, was moved from an institution to assisted living.

Nanette Whightsel, a patient’s parent says, "She's so much calmer, she's quieter, her seizures are under control better. Her whole life is so much better."

And the cost savings is being pledged to reduce a mammoth waiting list for services.
But officials concede at least a dozen of the center's patients can't make it in assisted living.
There's also the question, where will a thousand people go to find new jobs?

Rob Young, with the Economic Development Alliance says, "It's significant, but you're also in a metropolitan statistical area that has a labor force of about 250,000."

Late today, leaders of a union that represents workers at the facility, blasted Governor Mitch Daniels’ administration for this decision, saying that moving patients like these into community settings raises the risk of suicide attempts and incidents of arson.

The head of AFSCME says there's a real danger this could also result in the mistreatment or inadequate treatment of patients with mental illness.