‘Move to Oregon.’ One advocate’s advice to families of developmentally disabled By AUSTIN JENKINS • NOV 19, 2019 As families of people with developmental disabilities in Washington struggle to get access to state-paid services, there’s a renewed push to link funding increases to growth in population. Currently, nearly 14,000 people who meet the state’s criteria as developmentally disabled […]

Are developmental disability services a constitutional right in Washington? By AUSTIN JENKINS • SEP 30, 2019   For years, families of the developmentally disabled in Washington and their advocates have been frustrated that services in an institution, like one of the state’s Residential Habilitation Centers (RHCs), are an entitlement, but services in the community are not. Further fueling […]

13,000+ Washingtonians qualify for developmental disabilities services, but don’t get them By AUSTIN JENKINS  SEP 26, 2019   Three years ago, Lindsey Topping-Schuetz became a first-time mother when her son Owen was born. He was six weeks early and went immediately to the neonatal intensive care unit, where he spent the next 103 days. But that […]

This boy was institutionalized at age 12. Now he’s moving out — half a century later BY Austin Jenkins SEP 20, 2019   MaryAnn Brookhart remembers the day in 1964 when her parents dropped off her 12-year-old brother, Gregory Paul, at the Rainier School for the developmentally disabled in Buckley. She was 17 and had insisted […]

Developmentally disabled patients stuck in WA psychiatric hospitals with nowhere to go By AUSTIN JENKINS • SEP 13, 2019 This January, Carolyn Guinotte took her son Alan to the emergency room because he was unable to go to the bathroom. Alan is 30 years old, autistic and mostly non-verbal. But when it was time for Alan to get out […]

Contempt orders, fines as developmentally disabled patients languish in local hospitals By AUSTIN JENKINS • SEP 9, 2019   In recent months, court commissioners on both sides of the Cascades have found the state of Washington in contempt, and even imposed fines, over access to state psychiatric care for people with severe developmental disabilities. The cases involve people who’ve […]

Families, advocates sound alarm over patients stuck in the hospital without a medical need By AUSTIN JENKINS August 29, 2019   Christopher Davis was lying on the floor watching cartoons one night last December while his mother, Beverly, decorated her Spokane home for Christmas. From time to time, she showed him a decoration. But Christopher, a 46-year-old developmentally […]