ATTN: MT Program alumni
Your letter of testimony are needed!!
We are also seeking folks who can fund their own transportation to MT to testify!
DEADLINE FOR LETTERS - (tentatively 1/13)
NOT MUCH TIME LEFT!!!!
For those who would like clarification, in a nutshell Senator Schmidt is trying to pass a law which would require oversite, regulation and monitoring of currently unregulated programs like SCL, like MMS. Just as the state is required to do with all other child-caring institutions, ie. residential treatment programs, juvenile justice programs.
Places like SCL and MMS have fallen through a legal loophole by calling themselves therapeutic boarding schools, that way they don't get looked into by the state or any health care acrrediting body. In a recent informal study, we found MT does not investigate allegations of abuse at 'UNregulated facilities' because of this loophole and the private nature of the schools. That's why programs have effectively been able slide on by, mistreating children and calling it therapy.
Hopefully, with all of your hard work, our letters will put a stop to that.
Obviously this will not be easy to do. The Senator has no funds to bring folks in to testify - so if any of you are anywhere near Helena, MT please let us know if you would be willing to travel and cover expenses. Perhaps we (CAFETY) may be able to secure funding, this is tentative but an effort we are focusing on.
We all know there will be many current students and alumni expressing, in person, their devotion to both facilities. Few understand the mental break down that allows youth to become complicit in their own mistreatment, for this reason it is IMPERATIVE we work to present the flip-side of the industry to the MT State legislature.
So please take a moment to express your grievances and help spread the word!!
This is our big shot to help protect youth and stop the mistreatment so many of us both witnessed and experienced. Please ACT NOW!
Lenore Behar, Phd is collecting the stories to submit to Senator Schmidt.
Please e-mail her:
[email protected]Please don't hesitate to contact me with any questions.
Best,
kat & the CAFETY team
The Montana legislature meets from early January until the end of April, so things will move fast. They also meet every other year, so if Sen. Schmidt isn't successful, it will be another 2 years before she can try again. Also, MT has limits on congressional terms and 2009 will be her last one.
The bill that was passed last time was put in the Department of Labor, which was an attempt by the lobbyists/program directors to weaken it. In addition, the bill only called for a committee to determine what kind of oversight to provide. Their report, after 2 years, was that they need more time! To decide anything.
The new bill can be seen shortly and tracked at:
http://laws.leg.mt.gov/pls/laws07/law0203w$.startupIt is LC 1004 (use the second box for the bill #)
ALSO SEE:
Online PBS Doc on MT Industry
Who's Watching The Kids?
www.montanapbs.org