A group home for developmentally disabled adults in Traverse City has lost most of its residents over the last two years.
People who live at BrickWays get help with daily activities like cooking and doing their laundry, but changes in Medicaid have reduced their benefits to the point where they’re forced out of the home. The budget cuts have trickled down from the federal government into Michigan’s mental health system.
Advocates for the developmentally disabled say it’s not fair.
Twenty-three-year-old Brady Rossi is one of those affected. Brady has Fragile-X Syndrome, a genetic condition that causes developmental disabilities.
Brady’s mom, Erin O’Neill, says BrickWays has taught Brady to be more independent, but she’s worried he won’t be there much longer. That’s because last year, Brady took a test. The test asked if he could feed himself, and if he had ever destroyed property.
Brady failed the test, but his parents don’t really know why. They just know that after the test, they were told Brady would no longer get the money needed to stay at BrickWays.
This test was used by Northern Lakes CMH to evaluate Brady Rossi:
An 'arbitrary' test
“You know, that’s just not fair,” says Brady’s father, Jake Rossi. “That’s not fair to the folks that really need these services in our community.”
Rossi blames Northern Lakes Community Mental Health, an agency that serves six counties in northern Michigan. He says Northern Lakes created the test for the sole purpose of kicking people like Brady out of their group homes.
“That was the tool that they developed, tested themselves and implemented that screened out individuals like Brady from specialized residential,” says Rossi.
"We can’t run at a deficit indefinitely. We’d go out of business just like any other business." - Karl Kovacs, CEO of Northern Lakes CMH
Karl Kovacs, CEO of Northern Lakes Community Mental Health, says that’s not the case.
“It was designed to improve upon an assessment tool that we used prior to that,” says Kovacs.
But Kovacs says Northern Lakes has had to cut back services over the last few years – because of budget cuts. Since 2014, Kovacs has seen about $10 million of his budget disappear. He had to lay off 15 employees.
“The consumer is our number one priority. Always has been, always will be,” says Kovacs. “But when we’re faced with budget cuts, then you have to look at ways to reduce expense. We can’t run at a deficit indefinitely. We’d go out of business just like any other business.”
Kovacs is walking a fine line. On the one hand, budget cuts are forcing him to reduce services. On the other hand, he can’t use assessment tests – like the one that Brady Rossi failed – to weed people out.
A warning from the state of Michigan
Last fall, the state Department of Health and Human Services warned providers not to use assessment tests “arbitrarily.” Thomas Renwick wrote the letter. He says he knows providers like Northern Lakes are facing budget issues.
“But they can’t use a tool, in and of itself, as a hard or fast indicator of … capping a level of services that an individual is going to receive,” says Renwick.
“We all read that letter very carefully, and we determined that we weren’t using that assessment tool arbitrarily,” says Kovacs.
Renwick’s letter also made it clear to providers that they can’t use assessment tests as the only tool to figure out what services will be provided. The tests have to be part of a broader, “person-centered” process.
But in a court hearing last year, Brady Rossi’s caseworker, Lori Stendel, said that Northern Lakes knew the assessment tool would “possibly disqualify some people from specialized residential.”
Kovacs declined to comment on the court hearing.
“I have no problem with government agencies working within their budget constraints, but are we going to allow them to balance their budget on this population?” asks Jake Rossi.
"This school has really changed my life, and I’m really proud of it." - Brady Rossi
The Rossis lost that court hearing, and then things got worse. Not long after the hearing, Brady was dropped entirely from Northern Lakes. They will no longer pay for anything related to Brady’s care.
Before they dropped him as a client, Northern Lakes recommended two options for Brady.
One of them is adult foster care, where he would live in a home with other people like him. The rules would be different there, with less focus on independence. He might not be able to ride his bike or work his summer job at a greenhouse.
The other option would be his own apartment. His mom says that’s not an option.
“Brady cannot cook for himself. He can heat things up,”says Erin O’Neill. “He does not understand money. He needs help. He needs constant supervision.”
Most of Brady’s friends have already moved out of BrickWays because they, too, failed the test. But still, Brady wants to go back to the place he calls “school.”
“This school has really changed my life, and I’m really proud of it,” he says. “People have really given me the boundaries of what I can and can’t do. It really touches my heart. You need to realize that you have other people telling you that you need to be independent for who you are.”
Brady can stay at BrickWays as long as he wants, but at this point, it will be up to his parents to cover whatever costs social security doesn’t pay for.