Ahead of the November election, Monroe County Executive Cheryl Dinolfo and her opponent Adam Bello discussed an issue that many are calling a crisis in the county.
Tuesday night, Spectrum News introduced Tina Carney, who had to wait six months before receiving early intervention services to address her daughter Meredith’s speech delay.
Carney joined dozens of other parents with the Parents Helping Parents Coalition at the county legislation meeting Tuesday to demand action from the county on a shortage of care-providers and long waitlists for families in need.
“You don’t realize you need something until you need it and when it’s not there, then it’s a huge problem," Carney said. "And you think, ‘That’s what happens for a lot of families,’ and for me, I just thought, ‘That’s just how it works, right?’ Yeah, no, it’s not supposed to be that way.”
Early intervention before pre-school is funded by the state, but the group still believes the county can do more.
Democratic candidate for county executive Adam Bello says he has a four-point plan to tackle the issue if he were elected.
“The mandate here is to help children, and that’s our job — is to figure it out," Bello said, "One way or another, we have to figure out a way to help these kids.”
He says the county has had trouble effectively mobilizing lobbying efforts, and wants to change that.
“I would have a group of community leaders, myself, parents, advocates, providers; we should all be going to Albany together in a strategic, coordinated approach,” Bello said.
His plan would also include further raising the pre-school intervention rates the county does control, and creating a task force of community leaders and parents. And he wants to hire 10 more coordinators, which are employed by the county.
“Those caseload sizes are so high that they’re becoming unmanageable, and the workers are doing the best they can with the resources they have, but they need more bodies, more people helping to manage those caseloads,” Bello said.
But current Republican County Executive Cheryl Dinolfo says more coordinators don’t address the actual issue.
“There aren’t as many providers. So, even if the service coordinator, which the county is providing and picking up the slack for companies that have pulled out, the child may not be getting the services as frequently,” Dinolfo said.
Instead, she says the county has taken definitive action and raised the county’s pre-school early intervention rates by 15 percent to help keep those providers. And as far as lobbying goes, Dinolfo says she has been fiercely petitioning the state to do the same for their share of early intervention.
“So what I asked Robert Mujica, the budget director, to do was match Monroe County," Dinolfo said. "And take a leadership position, and let the state families know that the state cares about children as much as we do in Monroe County.”
She claims it was due to her efforts that the state increased funding by 5 percent this year, though she knows the increase is not nearly enough.
“Look, you’re there counting beans and we’re trying to save lives, right? So stop counting beans and do the right thing, do what Monroe County is doing," Dinolfo said. "We’re up 15 percent because that’s the right thing to do.”
She wants Parents Helping Parents to join her in Albany later this year to continue pressing the state for more; similar to what Bello suggested. But until change actually comes, Carney and her group will continue their fight.
“Let’s just take care of people. Early intervention is a vital service that has been proven to be super successful, and in the long term save money,” Carney said.