Wednesday, July 1, 2015

Federal Judges Orders Disability Services To Continue Despite State of Illinois Budget Impasse

as shared by Equip for Equality 07/01 at 7:56 AM.

Colleagues,
Yesterday, the ACLU of Illinois, Equip for Equality and the pro bono law firm Dentons filed emergency motions seeking court orders to ensure that services for people with disabilities under the three community integration Consent Decrees continue despite the lack of a new state budget.  

Federal judges entered orders requiring the State of Illinois to continue funding in Ligas v. Norwood and Colbert v. Rauner.  The decree in Ligas covers people with developmental disabilities living in large state-funded facilities seeking to move into the community, as well as people with developmental disabilities living in the family home seeking community services.  The decree in Colbert covers people with mental illness and/or physical disabilities living in nursing homes in Cook County who want to move into the community.  
A federal judge has been asked to enter a similar order in Williams v. Rauner, which covers people with mental illness living in large state-funded facilities who are seeking to move into the community.  The motion in Williams will be heard on Thursday, July 2nd.

If you have any questions about the three cases, please contact us as follows:
Colbert - Steve Libowsky - stephen.libowsky@dentons.com
Ligas - Barry Taylor - barryt@equipforequality.org or Laura Miller – laura@equipforequality.org
Williams - Ben Wolf - bwolf@aclu-il.org

Barry C. Taylor
VP for Civil Rights and Systemic Litigation

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