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In a
case raising important disability discrimination issues, the United
States District Court in Connecticut granted summary judgment in
favor of the Commissioner of the State Department of Education,
the Department of Children and Families, the town of Putnam Board
of Education, and other individuals sued in their official capacity.
The case was brought by parents of a psychiatrically disabled teenager
against the Commissioner of the State Department of Education and
others alleging violations of the Individuals with Disabilities
Education Act (IDEA), the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA),
and their due process rights. The parents sought enforcement of
a due process ruling in their favor in which DCF was joined as a
party over objections to the Due Process hearing officer's jurisdiction.
Specifically, the parents alleged that DCF's policy of placing time
limits on certain home based services in comparison to institutional
services was a violation of the Supreme Court's seminal holding
in Olmstead v. L.C. 527 U.S. 581 (1999).
M.K.
was initially entered into the "protective" services program of
DCF after the agency sought court ordered intervention due to abuse
and neglect. Protective services are mandatory in the sense that
the parent must accept the DCF's services. After providing a number
of services to M.K., DCF terminated all services to him other than
mentoring. M.K.'s mother requested an in-patient evaluation and
M.K was admitted to a psychiatric hospital for seven months and
then transferred to a residential school. After finally returning
home, DCF again discontinued all services. As a result of a number
of violent incidents at home which caused police involvement, DCF
admitted him again as a protective services case. DCF then requested
that the parents sign papers shifting M.K. to the voluntary services
project instead of through its protective services program. DCF
claimed that the shift to voluntary services would allow them to
provide services to M.K. without any allegation of neglect or abuse.
Unlike protective services, the voluntary program requires cooperation
of the parents and may not be imposed without parental acceptance.
The court
initially rejected M.K.'s claim that the district court did not
have subject matter jurisdiction over the case. M.K. claimed that
the case was barred by the failure of DCF to "exhaust all administrative
remedies" in the previous due process case. He claimed that the
DCF was required to present evidence as to whether it provided services
which impacted the child's ability to receive a FAPE before it could
contest jurisdiction. The court found that such a theory would present
a "catch-22" to DCF, either present such evidence at the hearing
or surrender any jurisdictional objection. Thus, the court noted
that there existed an exception to the exhaustion of administrative
remedies requirement, where such exhaustion would be futile. Because
DCF attended the hearing to contest jurisdiction, requiring exhaustion
of remedies would mean requiring the DCF to subject itself to the
process it was currently challenging.
The court
went on to add that there was no claim preclusion either because
the exercise of jurisdiction over DCF by the officer was improper
in the first place. IDEA claims against DCF were only proper when
DCF was acting as a local educational authority ("LEA", which was
only the case while M.K. was residing at the hospital. Because those
times were not at issue in the case the IDEA claims against the
DCF were improper.
Mrs.
K alleged more seriously that DCF's placing of time limits on voluntary
services in comparison to the unlimited resources provided to "protective"
services violated the ADA's prohibition on discrimination. Such
differential treatment she argued discriminated against people based
on the severity of their handicap. The court however rejected this
argument as well her dependence on the Supreme Court case of Olmstead.
The court
noted that Olmstead specifically held that the ADA did not impose
a "standard of care" nor a certain level of benefits. Rather, Olmstead
stands for the proposition that with the services the state does
provide it may not discriminate. It does not require that the state
provide opportunities for the individual to stay out of an institution.
The court noted that ADA has a comparative component meaning that
in order for there to be a violation of the ADA the person must
have been treated differently because of his disability. Here the
court found that the mother was merely challenging the adequacy
of the provision and not alleging discrimination. Moreover, the
court noted that Mrs. K had failed to even show that M.K. was receiving
any less services from the voluntary program as he would from the
protective services program. The court agreed with DCF's characterization
of the voluntary program as essentially providing equivalent services
and in no way fundamentally unequal to the protective services program.
As a
result, summary judgment was granted in favor of the defendants.
Jeremy
Clin, CCA Legal Intern (6/08).
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