Eye On Illinois: Can’t fully celebrate ‘one of the most backwards states in the nation’

Good news only gets you so far.

Tuesday’s column shed light on an impressive amount of planned infrastructure improvements. Wednesday’s examined the public victory lap regarding record hotel revenues. And today we’re going to talk about how any good news about the state’s fiscal outlook must be considered in light of the perpetual failure to adequately care for people with for mental health and developmental issues.

Recounting the litany of disturbing accounts covered here and elsewhere would require the rest of the space. But Capitol News Illinois, ProPublica and Lee Enterprises Midwest dropped yet another damning report Tuesday examining how the problems the same organizations thoroughly documented at Choate Mental Health and Developmental Center in downstate Anna are not limited to that one facility.

“People with developmental disabilities living in Illinois’ publicly run institutions have been punched, slapped, hosed down, thrown about and dragged across rooms,” according to Molly Parker and Beth Hundsdorfer. “In other cases, staff failures contributed to patient harm and death, state police and internal investigative records show.”

“People with developmental disabilities living in Illinois’ publicly run institutions have been punched, slapped, hosed down, thrown about and dragged across rooms. In other cases, staff failures contributed to patient harm and death, state police and internal investigative records show.”

—  Reporters Molly Parker and Beth Hundsdorfer

The reporters explained the state police division responsible for investigating criminal allegations against state employees has started 200 such queries at developmental centers in the last decade, most outside of Choate. This work represents “more allegations against workers at these seven residential centers than it does at any other department’s workplaces, including state prisons, which house far more people, according to an analysis of state police data.”

Such problems might seem insignificant when considering the facilities house “only” 1,600 people, barely a single percent of the state’s overall population. But that math is useless once you actually engage with the stories of the victims – people families entrusted to the state for critical care and protection – and then consider all of us are paying money into a system that inflicts these damages.

The governor’s office released a statement several hours after the report dropped Tuesday. In it, Gov. JB Pritzker announced he, “along with leaders in business and education from around the state will embark on a trade mission to the United Kingdom on July 16. The governor will kick off the international trip by attending the Goodwood Festival of Speed from July 13 to July 16 to discuss Illinois’ commitment to electric vehicle manufacturing with automobile, energy, and supply chain industry leaders.”

Here’s hoping someone during this jaunt raises a hand and repeats the ProPublica quote from Allan Bergman, a suburban consultant specializing in disability programs and policies: “This is one of the most backwards states in the nation on everything we know how to measure when it comes to the care of people with developmental disabilities.”

We can all appreciate an improving state economy. But money doesn’t buy basic human decency.

• Scott T. Holland writes about state government issues for Shaw Media. Follow him on Twitter @sth749. He can be reached at sholland@shawmedia.com.