Waiting
I have to admit I spend a fair amount of time in the car. But setting outside of the school waiting on my daughter gave me a chance to just think about waiting. Now I know she will be out soon. I know she is safe. I know she will be glad to see me. So this waiting doesn’t seem too bad.
I have talked lately about the now 65 people that have died while waiting on funding, but what about the 1975 people that are on the waiting list for Physical Disability Wavier services. Mothers, daughters, brothers, husbands, grandparents; they are at the center of this waiting. The projection for 2011 if no funding is given; is that there will be 4,264 persons waiting on PD services.
At a recent advocacy rally in Manhattan people lined the street. Joan Boller, a client with Three Rivers Independent Living Resource Center, said “It’s scary to know that you have no control over the decisions made about your life.”
There have been several discussions on the value of our state highways and roads. You have to have a good infrastructure to deliver goods and services that just makes for good business. The 13 Centers for Independent Living in Kansas have developed a very cost effective and efficient infrastructure to deliver a level of services that are capable of assisting the people of Kansas. Additionally the Centers are doing it at approximately one third the costs of people living in an institutional setting.
I am Simply Shari …At the center of waiting for our legislators.
