Global-Report-Living-Colour-dr2-2

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Inclusive Communities = Stronger Communities GLOBAL REPORT ON ARTICLE 19: THE RIGHT TO LIVE AND BE INCLUDED IN THE COMMUNITY 113 Drawing on the Canadian and USA experience, the Canadian Association for Community <strong>Living</strong> – People First of Canada Joint Task Force on the Right to Live in Community has identified 10 key recommendations as critical to creating real homes and planning the closure of an institution (The Right Way, 2010). To summarize, these are: • Involve champions for community living o The decision to close an institution requires vision, passion, leadership— and champions. While these champions can come from many sectors, traditionally family members and self-advocates take the lead role in demanding both institution closures and community supports. • Ensure that the needs and preferences of the person come first o Each individual must be empowered to choose where and with whom to live and the resulting living arrangement must truly be that person’s home. • Respect the experiences and roles of families o The perspectives of families must always be taken into account when initiating planning for an individual to move to his or her own home in the community. Families will often be the best source of information about the person and often form the nucleus of the person’s support network in the community. • Facilitate person centred plans and create a real home for each person o Engaging in respectful, person-centred planning will maximize the potential for achieving positive personal outcomes. The goal is to support the individual in ways that meet his or her needs and allow him or her to live in a real home, to participate meaningfully in community life, to make real choices and have his or her rights and wishes respected. • Create quality supports, services and safeguards o Resources previously allocated to the institutions are reallocated to communities to ensure adequate capacity to support everyone in the community. The need for increased capacity in communities is identified in a systematic and timely way, so that planning can occur and supports are in place when individuals make the move to their new homes. • Recruit and develop qualified support staff o The availability of skilled, knowledgeable employees to provide the individualized supports needed by individuals with intellectual disabilities in their homes and communities is vital to success. Many former institution staff can successfully transition to community-based environments and strategies for accommodating these staff need to be developed. • Establish community partnerships o The successful closure of an institution depends on sound collaborative working partnerships between individuals,
114 Inclusive Communities = Stronger Communities GLOBAL REPORT ON ARTICLE 19: THE RIGHT TO LIVE AND BE INCLUDED IN THE COMMUNITY families, government and community organizations. Alliances should be nurtured with family support organizations, local advocacy groups, social justice advocates, service groups, unions, business leaders and other possible allies. • Establish a clear plan and time frame for closing the institution o Government and community leaders must share a clear, unequivocal, public commitment that the institution will be closed, that resources will be allocated to the community and that planning will ensure that each person residing in the institution will be supported to move to his or her own home in the community. • Communicate the announcement clearly and effectively o Careful consideration must be given to how the closure decision is announced and how messages will be conveyed. Undoubtedly there be will at least some opposition to the closure, from various sources, and government and community leaders must be prepared with clear information about what is planned and why. • Carefully coordinate/support each person’s transition to the community o Many individuals make quick transitions to living in their new home with little to no negative impact. Others may require a more gradual change from the old environment to the new one. The people who know the person well will be in the best position to help plan the transition and any intermediate steps, if needed. Also in the consultation our member in New Zealand said it was also important that: • Where individuals do not have families involved, independent advocates should be appointed • People with disability who are moving from institutions and their families being able to visit good examples of community living so they can see how it works and undertake an evaluation While the real life stories of people who have left institutions, testimonials from families, and overwhelming research point to the world wide success of institutional closures, the process has not been without its share of mistakes. The way in which deinstitutionalization has taken place in many jurisdictions has left us with a legacy of institutional thinking which continues to characterize the way people receive supports and the way service systems are organized.
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