Thank you for publishing the article, “Illinois Faces Backlash Over Bid to End Oversight of Disability Services” by Molly Parker and Beth Hundsdorfer (7/24/24). The article outlines what the state of Illinois should be doing to help its citizens with disabilities and how it is falling short. The federal government apparently agreed that Illinois was falling short, so it issued its consent decree to provide some oversight. Now Illinois is trying to end that oversight.
Consent decrees are issued for good reasons. Sheriff of Cook County Tom Dart happily announced when the federal government stopped its decree that oversaw abuses at Cook County Jail. Now, we are reading about an unusual amount of preventable deaths at the facility last year. Perhaps more oversight is still necessary.
For Illinois, the oversight is still needed if disabled citizens are still being taken out of their communities and moved far from home and family. They are placed into homes that are too large and have too much abuse. Though the article cites some improvements, much is still needed to be done.
I hope that the federal courts do not release the state from the much-needed oversight. People and institutions behave better when being watched. Illinois has to work well for all of its citizens. If oversight is needed for the state to remember this goal, then let’s not end it.
Jan Goldberg, Riverside