Out-of-County Agency Takes Over : Parents of Disabled Protest Board Change

Hundreds of parents and caretakers of developmentally disabled children and adults in the East San Gabriel Valley are protesting a state decision to transfer supervision of services for the area’s 3,000 neurologically handicapped people to an agency in San Bernardino County.

The state Department for Developmental Services has awarded Inland Counties Regional Center, headquartered in San Bernardino, a one-year contract to run the San Gabriel Valley Regional Center, whose governing board’s contract was dropped by the state when it came up for renewal June 30.

Regional centers were established under state mental health legislation enacted in 1966. They are required to identify people who have neurological handicaps such as retardation, cerebral palsy and epilepsy, to assess their abilities and needs, and to contract for services to help them. California’s 21 private, nonprofit centers are funded by the state, and each is governed by its own board, whose members represent the area it covers.

Seven in L.A. County

The San Gabriel Valley Regional Center, one of seven in Los Angeles County, covers 27 cities in the Monrovia, Pomona and El Monte health districts. It was renamed Inland Center West on July 1, when the new administration took effect.

Paul Carleton, deputy director of community services for the California Department for Developmental Services, said in an interview that the action was taken because of a “lack of monitoring” by the San Gabriel Valley center in Covina and because the center’s fiscal management was “in total chaos.”

Marshall Mabry, chairman of the defunct San Gabriel Valley Regional Center Board of Trustees, acknowledged last week that the center failed to properly monitor many of its contract services and did an inadequate job of bookkeeping.

“The buck stops with the board,” Mabry said. “We have to take responsibility when things go wrong with administration.”

But Mabry said he is concerned about the change in management. “Inland Center has a different philosophy. . . . I’m afraid some of our programs will be cut or dropped,” he said.

Carleton said that there will be no program cutbacks and that the San Gabriel Valley center’s budget, which was $16.7 million last year, has been increased to $18 million for the 1985-86 fiscal year.

Parents and caretakers have called several meetings to bring their complaints to state and regional center spokesmen. At a meeting attended by more than 100 people in La Puente last week, critics said the appointment of Inland Counties Regional Center deprives them of the local representation required by law. They also said that Inland’s one-year contract violates a law that stipulates a 120-day interim management period by the state and then appointment of a new board when a regional center board loses its contract.

120-Day Period

Kenneth Nelsen, Carleton’s deputy assistant director, said in an interview this week that Inland has “an excellent record of administration” and choosing it to govern the San Gabriel Valley region was one of several options available to the department.

“We look at what’s best for all,” Nelsen said. “Inland was best able to mount a management team at the time, since the department’s staff is tied up with administering a San Jose center in a similar situation. The 120-day period is not a legal requirement--it is a limit establishing the length of time the state can run a regional center.”

Nelsen also said the Inland board “will be augmented with representatives from the San Gabriel Valley. It has to, because the law calls for local control.”

Rosella Alm, mother of an autistic son and president of REACH, a parent group for exceptional children at the East San Gabriel Valley School in Covina, said, “My biggest gripe is that this was done without our knowing it, and we have no way of being sure our children will get the care they need. We’re capable of forming a board of our own.”

Another parent, Bonnie Clemans, who works for a treatment center for handicapped children, said such children often need individualized attention and parents need respite, programs that have been provided by the San Gabriel Valley Center.

“We have no assurance that these will be continued,” Clemans said.

Verlin Woolley, Inland’s executive director, said at the meeting that Inland will continue existing services and programs and that Inland’s philosophy is the same as other centers--to provide the best available care for its clients.

“Our services are virtually the same as those of San Gabriel Valley,” Woolley said. “It is not our intention to dramatically change any services your son or daughter is receiving. Inland Center will not come in with a big knife and start slashing.”

He said Inland refused to accept a contract to take over the San Gabriel Valley center for less than a year “as a matter of stability.”

“We did not solicit this contract,” he said. “If we’d known of this community concern, we probably would not have accepted it. I don’t expect to fight you over our being here more than a year. If you want local control, I sure support that.”

Parents at the La Puente meeting also objected to having to attend board meetings as far away as San Bernardino. Inland Center’s board meetings will be alternated between the two areas, Wooley said.

Carleton said Inland’s lower cost for client care reflect’s the center’s ability to use local resources. For instance, he said, it uses existing school district programs for some children’s activities, and has Medi-Cal finance some adult programs.

Among the opponents of the state’s action is the board that oversees Los Angeles County’s seven regional centers, called Area 10 for Regional Centers. Its executive director, Bruce Saltzer, joined other protesters at the meeting who expressed concern that the state may have chosen Inland Center for financial reasons that could mean cutting services. Inland’s annual expenditure of about $540 for each client is the lowest of the state’s 21 centers, less than half of the San Gabriel Regional Center’s $1,300 annual cost per client, he said.

Saltzer said Area 10 has asked Inland Regional Center to preserve existing services in the San Gabriel Valley for 120 days, and to permit formation of a new board.

The state last year examined the San Gabriel Valley Regional Center’s accounting system after an investigation raised questions about the quality of care in some of the homes it contracted with. State officials ordered the San Gabriel Valley center to toughen the monitoring of its programs or face the loss of its contract.

Carleton said there was no evidence of corruption or fraud, but that accounting procedures were inadequate.

Lois Booker, San Gabriel Valley Regional Center’s board chairman last year, said part of its problems stemmed from having an “overburdened” system with 135 group homes.