URGENT!! Need You to CALL - EMAIL -WRITE LEGISLATORS

[Guest guest]

Please take the time to read this and please contact your legislators and tell them that we cannot afford any more cuts to the Developmental Disability population. We have already sustained cuts that are devistating families and to ask for more cuts is not moral. The most vulnerable in our society cannot speak for themselves. It is up to us. Parents, caregivers, friends, relatives, grand parents, aunts, uncles, cousins, etc. to speak for them.

(INSERT NAME OF YOUR ORGANIZATION)

Important Information on Proposed Budget Cuts for Medicaid Waiver

As you may have heard, the Florida Legislature will be meeting in a special session beginning January 5-16, 2009 to address the budget shortfall for this year. Governor Crist has ordered all state agencies to withhold 4% of their budget for this year and 10% of their budget for next year, and has told them to prepare for these cuts to be permanent. Even so, this 4% cut will cover only $585 million dollars of the $2.3 billion dollars that must found to balance the 2008-2009 State of Florida budget.

Additional money must be found either through cuts in state services, raising taxes or the use of loans or trust fund money. During the January special session, the legislature will be looking at making cuts in programs, as they have said they do not wish to raise taxes. This includes possible cuts to services to our family members who are developmentally disabled. These funding cuts would be in addition to the Tier funding cuts that go into effect in January.

Funding for our programs is already at a bare bones level. Further cuts will mean a loss of services. As it is, we have already seen some group homes in Hillsborough County close their doors this year. The remaining already stressed service providers have scrambled to help those affected find new places to live. We continue to have 17, 932 people on the waiting list in Florida, and we have one of the lowest funding rates for services in the country. I realize that the holiday season is a busy time, but please make the time to contact your state legislators to urge them not to cut funding for services to the developmentally disabled. Your phone call, email or letter can make a real difference if you act now! Tell your friends and relations to contact their legislators as well since numbers count!

It is important that you do this by mail, email or phone before January 5th. Make these important points:

· We are not asking for more money, only to keep the minimal funding we have now.

· Although our disabled family members may not vote, their friends and relatives do vote.

· We have long memories and we will be politically active if treated unfairly; that we will remember how they have acted when they are running for reelection.

· Let them know what these services mean to your family personally, and what your life would be like if services should disappear.

· Tell them that the budget should not be balanced on the backs of those who most need help. The legislature should find the money in streamlining administrative costs or eliminating tax exemptions not by cutting direct services.

If you don’t act, and funding is cut, services will disappear.

The editorial staff of the Daytona News Journal (12/16/2008) expressed it well when they wrote, “State programs intended to help the sick, elderly, disabled and young have been slashed to the point of inhumanity. Taking more from them, in the name of balancing the budget, would be immoralâ€.

If you have questions or problems contacting your legislators, please call (INSERT YOUR NAME) My cell phone is always on and I check my email every day. (INSERT YOUR NUMBER AND EMAIL).

To find legislator contact information, MyFlorida.com contains House and Senate listings:

http://www.flsenate.gov/Legislators/index.cfm?Mode=Find%20Your%20Legislator & Submenu=3 & Tab=legislators

You also can call the League of Woman Voters at (INSERT YOUR LOCAL CHAPTER NUMBER HERE), tell them your address, and they will tell you who your state legislators are and how to contact them.

Please act quickly; the services provided to every developmentally disabled adult in Florida are at risk.

(SIGN YOUR NAME)

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