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Alright – so, if you know me or read my blog then you know I am not a fan of Minnesota Autism Center (MAC). There are many reasons why and in fact, I am one of probably hundreds in the autism community that feel the same way about MAC. One of the main reasons is how MAC bullies families, silences employees and gets away with doing so many wrong things.

One of MAC’s previous employees BW stated that two children were involved in an abuse situation under the care of Page Berland who is a licensed professional clinical counselor. According to this employee, Page was notified of this incident by the lead therapist in their Woodbury location. Page then informed Kathryn Marshall the director there who said to burry it and not even tell the kid’s parents. Let’s think about that for a minute. Let’s say you are an autism parent and your child goes to MAC and something horrible happens to your child who can’t tell you what happened. Then imagine the adults in charge of your child’s care not only allow abuse, but fail to tell the parents and fail to report it to the authorities. MAC’s horrible actions under the direction of Kathryn Marshall and Ron Carey are reprehensible.

I met this therapist and what she has said in how families and children are treated are simply cruel, wrong and unethical. Below are some of her words to me.

” I still felt very uncomfortable with the fact that the parents had not been informed about the situation. I knew that I was going to be conducting family skills with my client’s parents later in the day and I felt sick about looking them in the eyes and essentially lying by omission. I knew that if I wrote out in detail about what happened I may be more likely to get a response from my supervisors so I sent an email to Camille, Paige and I believe I cc’ed Kathryn as well. I voiced my concerns and wanted to know what I should say to his parents at family skills that day. Within 5 minutes I got a phone call from Camille. She was irate that I had put everything in writing and reprimanded me for not “letting it go”. Camille repeated many times over the phone, “it is done. I thought you understood. This conversation is over.”

BW also said the following which sickens me deeply.

“In addition to this event, during my time at the Minnesota Autism Center I witnessed many other events that were also disturbing.

Alright – so, when it rains it pours. Chair of Public Safety and Crime Prevention in  Minnesota House of Representatives seems to be confused about what happened in Minnesota to yet another Black man. You see Philando Castille was not a THUG nor a criminal. He was actually a productive member of society who worked years at the same job. Rather than ask and wait for facts – Rep Cornish puts his mouth in his ass. Now this guy is no average Jack. He is the one in charge of the public safety committee in the state. In other words, whatever bills or legislations he wants only get through and become law in Minnesota. He has a pretty powerful position in the state. Yet, he sounds like an immature toddler. Clearly he has no clue about Minnesota’s horrible racial bias statistics from the justice system to education to health.

In response, there has been many folks that have been vocal and wrote back. I think that is waste of time and quite frankly worthless. The best thing is to figure out how to either A. defeat him at the polls this year or B. demand that he is removed from his post as chair. Both are doable, but it must be carried out strategically. To defeat him means someone else has to run against him in the district he represents which does not have a lot of minority voters, but if his racist message and stupidity gets to the voters, it may work. The other way is to pressure Speaker Rep Kurt Daudt to take his chair position away which he may do if pressured intensely. Rep Daudt can be reasonable and needs every vote he can get to keep the house this year.

This would be my advice to Mpls and St. Paul NAACP and other minority leaders in Minnesota to demand and push. In other words, if all we do is to just complain with no plan behind then nothing will happen. Protesting and complaining without a plan of action is really waste of time and resources. I am hopeful that maybe Mpls NAACP President Nekima will do it. I am not so sure about the St. Paul one. He is usually not up to speed on social justice in a manner that is meaningful. In parallel, I would recommend asking a legislator to write a bill that would collect racial data for county and district attorneys in how they prosecute or not as well as individual cop statistics. Currently, we don’t have any law requiring that. For example, word on the street is Sen Amy K was notorious for putting away and prosecuting Black defendants but we have no proof because there is no data collection. A legislation could be written requiring all new police officers in the state to go through cultural competency training and how to de-escalate situations especially situations involving persons of color as most White police officers have no idea. Getting body cameras for everyone and in every police car would take the guessing of what happened out. Assuring grand-jury selection reflects the communities they serve would take out the implicit bias that exists currently. Another suggestion would be for minorities to run for county & district attorney positions. Currently, out of the 87 counties in Minnesota, only one is minority in Ramsey county and zero, zilch, zip are Black.

A legislator could also write a bill that requires police officers must live in the areas they patrol which would then create a true community policing. Imagine if the police officers in minority communities actually lived there. They would have more empathy and understanding. Final suggestion would be to pressure Commissioner of DPS Dohman to hire more minority state troopers as well as middle and upper management in Minn Dept of Public Safety. Currently, their racial stats suck (not a typo). Don’t get me wrong, I like Dohman and even admired her standing behind Gov Dayton when he made that speech stating racism is alive and well in Minnesota but action and doing always speaks louder.

By the way, the Senate chair for the public safety committee, Sen Dibble  who chairs the Senate public safety committee is no better than Rep Cornish, except he is more educated, more civil and probably more polite but his civil rights and equal justice record is just as bad. In Africa, they would say, Rep Cornish is a loud hyena and Sen Dibble is a quite hyena. The question is which do you prefer a loud one that barks when he is coming or a quite hyena that smiles at you while he still eats you.  As someone that was a hard core DFLer that is until I came to Minn and met the likes of Rep Norton (queen of autism discrimination) and others like her, I would advice voters of color to not vote blindfolded. For example, guess what the district attorney for Ferguson that refused to charge the killer of Michael Brown was – that is right a DFLer who even won again after his bias decision. Guess who else is a DFLer – the Hennepin County Attorney who also sided with the White defendant rather than with the Black victim. And, he is up for re-election again soon.  Hip Hop Republican wrote an eloquent op-ed on this that is very true to this sentiment. In other words, just because they say the right things, sound educated, are polite and even seem genuine DFL politician, don’t assume their actions are fair, equal, right or even accurate. In fact, most areas with the highest racial disparities in health, education and justice are led by White DFLers. Not kidding.

Finally, what does this have to do with autism as I have no desire to be the Jackie of all trades. Simple answer – if you think racism only exists in the justice system – think again. Let’s explain this in another way. When Gov Dayton said if this man was White – this incident would not have happened as it did. Well – if so many Black children with autism were White then racist providers like Lovaas and MEAP would’ve provided therapy and treat all children equally and fairly..

Folks use your votes wisely and negotiate with it.

More info on Minnesota’s racial profiling going back years. And, it is still happening – racism exists and is alive and well in this passive aggressive state of 10,000 racial disparities.

Above words do not represent any committee, agency or candidate.

Idil – Somali Autism Mom & Minority Advocate

Alright – so, Jesse Williams who is an amazing actor and plays a doctor in Grey’s Anatomy gave the best race speech in recent history last night at the BET awards. What does this have to do with autism? Everything. For example, we know that racial disparity exists in accessing services and treatments for minority kids on the spectrum. This does not happen by mistake. Providers like racist A-holes like Lovaas take Caucasian kids while they put minority kids on endless waiting list or discharge them because they are too old at age 5. Subliminally bias ABA providers like MEAP don’t even have one Black autistic child in their program, according to public information for 2013 and 2014. Probably they still don’t to date.

You see racism happens daily in every corner in this state and in this country. And, Jesse spoke eloquently about it last night. The good  thing is that we (minorities) have the power to change this with our votes, our voices and our buying power. Sadly, we have not yet figured out a collective and cohesive way to do this so that the oppressor can no more. For example, imagine if we voted out elected officials whose policies have hurt or not made a significant change in the right direction. There are dozens like that in Minnesota. Imagine if we spoke against racist providers, companies, agencies, departments, so on and so forth until they changed. This is an election year folks – vote wisely and hold them accountable for their polices as well as how they allocate resources to various communities and areas.

Governor Dayton approving couple of cents for minority grants and even finally allowing the state agencies to be audited in how they follow federal and state civil rights laws in hiring or in this case how they don’t follow is still not good enough to erase decades of real racial injustices and racial inequalities. Equal policies, equal access, equal rights and equal opportunities are better and needed. Let’s vote wisely this year and vote out the useless politicians that hindered progress in our communities.

Anyway, I was moved by his speech as were millions of others. Below is his full speech and the link to the video.

Read His Speech in Full:

“This award, this is not for me. This is for the real organizers all over the country. The activists, the civil rights attorneys, the struggling parents, the families, the teachers, the students, that are realizing that a system built to divide and impoverish and destroy us cannot stand if we do.

All right? It’s kind of basic mathematics:, the more we learn about who we are and how we got here, the more we will mobilize. Now this is also in particular for the black women, in particular, who have spent their lifetimes dedicated to nurturing everyone before themselves. We can and will do better for you.

Now, what we’ve been doing is looking at the data and we know that police somehow manage to de-escalate, disarm and not kill white people every day. So what’s going to happen is we are going to have equal rights and justice in our own country or we will restructure their function and ours.

Now the thing is though, all of us in here getting money, that alone isn’t going to stop this. All right? Now dedicating our lives to get money just to give it right back for someone’s brand on our body, when we spent centuries praying with brands on our bodies and now we pray to get paid for brands on our bodies.

There has been no war that we have not fought and died on the front lines of. There has been no job we haven’t done, there’s been no tax they haven’t levied against us, and we’ve paid all of them. But freedom is somehow always conditional here. “You’re free,” they keep telling us. But she would’ve been alive if she hadn’t acted so… “free.”

Now, freedom is always coming in the hereafter. But, you know what though? The hereafter is a hustle. We want it now. And let’s get a couple of things straight, just a little side note: The burden of the brutalized is not to comfort the bystander. That’s not our job, all right, stop with all that. If you have a critique for the resistance, for our resistance, then you better have an established record of critique of our oppression. If you have no interest in equal rights for black people then do not make suggestions to those who do. Sit down.

We’ve been floating this country on credit for centuries, yo, and we’re done watching and waiting while this invention called whiteness uses and abuses us, burying black people out of sight and out of mind, while extracting our culture, our dollars, our entertainment like oil, black gold. Ghettoizing and demeaning our creations then stealing them, gentrifying our genius and then trying us on like costumes before discarding our bodies like rinds of strange fruit. The thing is, though, the thing is that just because we’re magic, doesn’t mean we’re not real.”

Above words do not represent any agency, candidate or committee.

Idil – Somali Autism Mom & Minority Advocate

Alright – so, Governor Dayton hired a new commissioner for Minnesota Department of Human Services (DHS) Emily Johnson Piper. Ms. Johnson Piper has zip, zero, zilch, zippity human services experience. Oh – and she is closer to a toddler in age.

Why you ask would Dayton hire someone with no experience in this agency that oversees the state’s most vulnerable population? Well – one name, Tina Smith. Or as I like to call her “heartless hammer Smith”. You see Smith is Dayton’s Lt. Governor. She was his chief of staff before and Mayor RT’s chief of staff in Minneapolis before that. Smith is very smart and a calculating politician that rewards her friends very well. Ms. Johnson Piper was her general counsel before DHS. She was not there for a long time and was hired after Micah Hines’ departure. Micah was an African American and I can’t even imagine Dayton hiring Micah to lead DHS. That would be insane for a person of color to be given such opportunity.

On the other hand, for an Anglo Minnesotan with zero experience – well then it is ok. And they tell us there is no racism in this state. Please, stop living under a rock.

In my minute and half of advocating autism issues, I have seen so many Anglo Minnesotans hired in positions they did not qualify for. Dan Pollock is another example who is number two at the state health department. Mr. Pollock has been given so many opportunities that might make your head spin. I have even seen DHS and MDH create positions for Anglo folks they like. Meanwhile, employees of color are told “you don’t qualify, you are not the right person, the right fit, we don’t have the budget, yada and more BS yada”.

Ms. Johnson Piper’s claim to experience is that her mother is a city council member in Minneapolis. That is basically it. When asked about her new position, Ms. Johnson Piper replied “I am going to tour the state and talk to stake-holders”. Great, because that is what we need more talking from someone who has no clue about human services. In other words, while she is on a learning tour, folks with disabilities including autism, the poor and the elderly will just have to suffer and wait for her to gain some useful experience.

If anyone understands Minnesota politics – then they will understand Dayton asked Smith her thoughts and she is the one that recommended Johnson Piper. Heck, Dayton wasn’t even there during the announcement.

Sight of good news – MN House Minority Rep Thissen suggested to break up DHS as it is too big for one person to handle which is probably his Minnesota nice way of saying “this new commissioner can’t possibly handle all of DHS’ issues”. On the other hand, even the U.S has one HHS department and within that there are agencies such as CMS, HRSA, etc. Majority of other states also have one HHS and agencies under that control each area. In other words, one area within HHS as Thissen suggested does not necessarily have to be similar to another area.

My friendly advice for anyone of color who voted for Dayton/Smith is when will you learn that all our votes are good for is pandering words and nothing more. Take a look at Dayton’s advisers and staff. The few folks of color they have including the one Somali are ……wait for it…..constituent coordinators. This is called Anglo Privilege which no one is fighting against, but everyone wants to eliminate affirmative action. Nice!

When will we learn to use our votes as a bargaining chip.

Above words do not represent any candidate, committee or agency.

Idil – Somali Autism Mom & Minority Advocate

Alright – so, if you follow politics in Minnesota or nationwide then you heard that Ron Carey has been hired by Ben Carson for his Minnesota campaign. Mr. Carey runs the fake MAC school which lies to families by telling them it is a public school, then tells the state education department it is a private school then tells the state Medicaid agency it is an ABA center. All of this happens because DHS has no oversight or accountability for CTSS providers.

Well – this honest guy is now going to help Carson get some votes in Minnesota. Carson might’ve had better luck hiring Mr. Grinch. I wonder if Mr. Carey will now leave his post at the autism fake MAC school. Or will he still collect his six figure salary from the state Medicaid agency. My guess is no reporter will ask him that.

Remember the song about Mr. Grinch that says “you are as charming as an eel, Your heart is an empty hole” When I think of what Mr. Carey has done to autism children and families – I think of the song lyrics of Mr. Grinch.

I am not a fan of Carson as a politician. I don’t think he understands political policies at all. Don’t get me wrong, he has gifted hands and was a brilliant surgeon but politics are a whole different beast. Hiring Carey can’t help him. If you remember, Michelle Bachmann also hired Carey. How did that work out for her

If history is a good indicator – it won’t work out for Carson either. I am certain Carey can’t bring winning votes for Carson in Minnesota.

Above words do not represent any committee, agency or candidate.

Idil – Somali Autism Mom & Minority Advocate

Alright – so, if you have a child with autism, work in the field or are an advocate – you heard of Minnesota Autism Center (MAC). They are arguably the biggest applied behavior analysis (ABA) center in Minnesota with over three hundred kids and even more employees. They are also arguably the most greedy, most dictatorship and selfish provider (my humble little opinion).

The MAC school is run by a politician, former chair of Minnesota Republican Party of Minnesota – Mr. Ron Carey. There are so many things wrong with this scenario one of which is a politician running a school is like a Catholic Nun running a night club. It just doesn’t fit or make sense. Nevertheless, Mr. Carey who has high political connections in the state decided to do just that. He has opened two fake schools in Minnesota which are located in Eagan and a recent one in Mankato.

Here is the problem with these schools. THEY ARE NOT A SCHOOL.

Mr. Carey tells the Minnesota department of education – they are a nonpublic school or a private school. Then he tells the families they are a public free school that is paid by medical assistance. Then, he tells the state Medicaid department – they are an ABA center so they can bill Medicaid. In other words, medical assistance cannot cover education, but MAC school takes no public education funding. Sound confusing and deceptive, right? Because it is and that is the way Mr. Carey likes to run things. Oh, and he is from the party that tells everyone to pull their darn selves by their darn bootstraps. Yet, he seems to be pulling himself by  Medicaid bootstraps to the tune of over $150,000 a year salary and MAC collected over $34 millions from DHS just the last two years alone. How do you like them apples!

You see all of this drama happens under the nose of DHS and Commissioner Jesson. Let’s remember this is the agency that goes after Somali child care owners if they sneeze the wrong way. Yet, for Mr. Carey – their response is mediocre at best. They are looking into it, are writing policy request letters, my favorite “what are we suppose to do with the over 100 kids that go to the fake school?”. Ah, excuse me Commissioner Jesson, but where was this compassion when your agency was closing minority child care centers like they were flies, faster than a NY minute and dropping charges on them like a hot potato? Come on now.

You can’t be this unfair and bias in a publicly funded program.

To make matters worse, many families, advocates from the disability law center, the Ombudsman’s office and Pacer have been complaining about this fake school and how children don’t graduate, the families have no due process rights, etc. All the while, DHS wants to play see no evil and hear no evil. Come on DHS – your primary responsibility is to assure children with disability including autism and their families are not lied to which is what Mr. Carey is doing and to assure the safety and quality of care.

Additionally, DHS has zero idea how many kids exactly go to the fake Eagan and Mankato school, how many hours kids do there, what are their ages, how much they paid them for just these two locations, etc. In other words, DHS just approves a blank check with no oversight, accountability or assuring quality of care nor treatment is individualized. Really, who the heck needs those things anyway.

I think DHS is failing in this miserably and intentionally.

Commissioner Jesson, You are by far one of my favorite state agency commissioners, but you can’t play Jim Carrey Dumb and Dumber or Richard Pryor/Gene Wilder see no evil/hear no evil forever. You are smart and can see this, and must address it soon.

How can you say such sweet words, yet have such salty double standard and bias policies in how minority vs. Anglo providers are treated. How do you do that – talk both sides of your mouth? Why can’t you be fair and equal as well as protect vulnerable children with autism and their families?

Ask Mr. Carey;

1. if this is a private nonpublic school, how much does it cost per year?

2. do children graduate, how many have graduated thus far?

3. If this is a private nonpublic school, why do the kids take medical transportation?

4. If this is a private nonpublic school, why do you bill Medicaid? Better yet, why don’t you pull DHS records and check this.

This is your responsibility alone and no one else. You have the authority and quite frankly the obligation to correct this problem that has been going on for a long time. Have you not learned any lessons from the Jensen case. If you don’t fix this, the families of these children who are abused, neglected and bullied might start another Jensen. If that does not wake you up then God help us all.

Above words do not represent any candidate, agency or committee.

Idil – Somali Autism Mom & Minority Advocate

Alright – so, State Rep Norton who represents Rochester Minnesota said she will not be running for re-election next year in 2016. I for one could not be happier about that for many reasons. Let’s start from the beginning. Rep Norton has single handedly been the queen of autism disparity in Minnesota. If any of her horrible autism legislations passed – we would’ve had even more autism racial disparity.

Norton has written the first autism legislation asking the state legislature to pass a mandate to cover applied behavior analysis therapy for only wealthier private insurance autism families and knowingly excluded poor autism children that had public insurance, i.e. MA or Medicaid. I remember back in 2010 when we first found out one of her first ABA autism bills – we testified against her relentlessly. We went to her office and after we asked why she was writing such discriminatory bill – she kicked us out of her office. Not kidding – this is the Minnesota house which is suppose to be people’s house. And this Representative thought it was her private house. From that day on – we fought her consistently and persistently and prevailed in every legislative session defeating her racist autism bills by asking “cover ABA therapy for all kids or for none”.

To make matters worse, I mistakenly called Dan Pollock who back then was assistant to MN House Majority leader and asked help in appointing someone to fill the vacant seat in MN state autism task force because Rep Slawik (she was good) left. And, what do you know he asks back then Speaker Thissen to appoint Norton. Because of Norton’s divisive tactics and hurtful legislations along with her arrogant personality – the task force ended abruptly before its time and thousands of autism families were left without guidance and assistance at the state legislature. In fact, Norton wrote a bill to dismantle the state task force which passed in the house. Luckily, we fought and won in the senate and in the final Health and Human Services Policy Conference Committee, but the remaining GOP legislators for some reason did not continue the much needed and important state autism task force.

You see whatever Norton touched or wherever she went always ended bad for autism especially minority autism children and families.

We also campaigned against her, but sadly she kept winning. The last election, we could not even get someone to run against her. She represents a fairly conservative part of Rochester and hopefully someone who is compassionate and fair will run this time and win.

Goodbye and Good Riddance Rep Norton – you will NOT be missed by many minority autism families. We are glad you are finally leaving the state legislature.

Not surprisingly, when Norton announced her decision to not run – DFL minority leader Thissen thanked her for her autism work. Now what now? only a clueless Minnesota DFL would think and say something like that out-loud.

Above words do not represent any agency, committee or candidate.

Idil – Somali Autism Mom & Minority Advocate

Alright – so, if you live in Minnesota and have a child with autism – you’ve probably heard of Minnesota Autism Center (MAC). They are arguably the biggest Applied Behavior Analysis therapy provider in Minnesota – not the best, just the biggest. MAC also serves the most Somali Autism children partly due to myself and two other autism parents that few years ago enrolled over 25 Somali autism families and some of them had multiple children with autism. My guess is those 25 families probably told another 25 families to take their children to MAC centers which are located throughout the state of Minnesota.  Sound all good, right. What is wrong when an ABA provider wants to take minority children given that they usually either discharge our kids at age 5, never take them or just ignore our community.

Well – as they say it is all in the pudding. It turns out MAC is simply just greedy and cruel in how many Somali autism families are treated including myself. We are often told “you better bring your child to our center for 8 hours a day irrespective of if your child is 2, 10 or 18 or hit the road”. We are told “you can’t observe your own child learn in a publicly funded program unless you make an appointment weeks a head of time”. We are told “your child is being discharged this afternoon – come pick him up now”. We are told “don’t bother bringing your child back tomorrow”. Our kids are neglected and abused in their Woodbury center and probably other centers. Most of our kids are ordered and dictated to go to their Woodbury location which is supervised by a high school graduate Camille Heyman. Our kids in centers hardly learn any skills yet they have been doing 8 hours a day for years and years.  And any parent that God forbid asks questions about their child’s treatment – guess what they are labeled….wait for it…it is original …..not really……that is right “angry emotional Black parent”.

All of this happens under the approval of the state Medicaid agency DHS. Even worse, we are told “they are too big to fail”. I think …..no I know they are not too big to fail. They are too greedy by demanding 40 hours a week for every child and too cruel to survive. Our kids who are just as red blooded Americans are too important to fail and to be neglected or abused by MAC. Yet, DHS who closes Somali owned child care centers faster than a NY minute seems to drag its feet, crawls or pretends to be deaf and blind when it comes to protecting vulnerable children with autism. WTF?

No therapy is better than bad therapy where children are neglected, abused, abandoned and parents harassed and intimidated. I have seen even MAC staff that pee in their pants when they hear the name of the owners of MAC Ms. Marshall and Ron Carey because of the heartache they went through there. I have seen staff that say they had premature babies due to the stress that Marshall and Carey have put on them. I have seen parents cry for weeks and months because of how their children were treated by Marshall and Carey, I have seen despair and frustration beyond belief and DHS still does not blink. WTF? Icing on the cake is when Minnesota’s ABA lobbying group denied MAC to join them. I have always wondered about that. It turns out many of their members said if MAC joins we are leaving. Let’s put this into a more understandable context – the lobbying group that was advising the red t-shirt wearing gang that I advocated against for years at the state Capitol for low income ABA coverage thought MAC was too cruel for them. Still don’t get that analogy – well let’s add some comedy. Remember when the nut job Trump made those demeaning and cruel statements about Mexican immigrants and other things…well Bill O’Reilly from FOX thought he was a nut job. Get it, the king of nut jobs O’Reilly thinks Trump is more nuttier.

The better question now is – Why is it that DHS can site any wrong doing in Somali child care centers – some even when the kids were still there and for some reason MAC is too big to fail. They are not too big to fail – our kids are too important to be abused, neglected and abandoned. Why can’t DHS say like they should “our responsibility is to protect vulnerable children with autism”.  Why does DHS allow a fake Eagan MAC school lie to parents who think that is a public school, but it is just another ABA center. Why can’t MDE (the state education dept) make sure a school is a school is a school. There are a lot of questions and hardly any answers from both DHS or MDE.

I have seen many parents that just give up and say Ms. Marshall and Ron Carey are too high powered people for anything to change and Kevin Goodno who was previous DHS commissioner is now their lobbyist. Ms. Marshall is a local attorney and Mr. Carey was the chair of the Minnesota Republican Party who have friends in high places. My response – so bleeping what? our kids with autism are more important than any lawyer, lobbyist or politician. Shouldn’t our kids be protected by the current governor who is in charge now Dayton and his current commissioner of DHS Jesson? Why should they care if xyz is a high powered BS. I don’t give a flying hoot and no other parent cares.

We want…..no – we demand DHS and Gov Dayton do something and stop this abuse, neglect and abandonment of our children with autism by MAC. There ain’t no buts, ifs and BS about it. Our kids with autism deserve a good quality ABA therapy where parents have a say in their own children’s treatment plan, where children are never abused and where their therapist are actually trained, not some high school diploma holder. If you ever wondered why Minnesota has one of the highest racial disparity in the country. Wonder no more…MAC is the perfect example.

I ask DHS to wake the heck up, stop crawling and protect all kids with disabilities including autism or this will be another Jensen case. Actually even worse, because these are children not adults and if DHS can’t protect vulnerable children then what the heck is it for?

Commissioner Jesson – I have been advocating in your corner since you were on this position for four days back in 2010, quite frankly I am tired of asking to please assure the health and safety of autism kids. If one more person at DHS tells me to be patient or if you assign me to one more person – I am going to scream. The buck stops with you and you need to take action. No more talking, let your actions speak for you. Our kids are too important to fail and DHS is failing them miserably. The notion that all kids must do 8 hours of ABA a day is not based on science nor research. It is based on greed and their audacity to bully families in a publicly funded program that you oversee and regulate is simply shameful and cruel. Autism by itself is challenging enough, adding greed and cruelty makes it unbearable. You must do something about this because we are not going to be silenced nor bullied and intimated by Ms. Marshall or Mr. Carey anymore.

Above words do not reflect any candidate, agency or committee.

Idil – Somali Autism Mom & Minority Advocate

Alright – so, Rep Carolyn Laine a DFLer from Columbia Heights introduced a bill this legislative session to strip the little authority & power that Minnesota Ethnic councils had. Let’s put this into perspective – Minnesota has some of the largest racial gap between Whites and Minorities and Rep Laine said too bad – so sad and nothing for us.

This is the norm for many MN DFLer’s once they get to the legislature – they take the minority vote for granted and silence our voices and our rights. Council on Black Minnesotans was created in 1980 by MN GOP to assure equal access in social, political, economic and resources for Black Minnesotans. Edward McDonald is a highly educated and extremely smart person and the director of the Council on Black Minnesotans. Edward has supported minority autism issues ever since he started this position and I for one am in his corner.

Edward and the council released a report that should’ve prompted a thorough investigation into the high racial disparity in Minnesota. Instead it prompted a legislation to silence him and fire him from his job. Well – Laine said he can re-apply for the job again. How nice of her. Except the hiring agency is not the council’s board, but the legislative coordinating commission. This commission has seven staff and zero is a person of color, yet they are in charge of hiring the directors for minority councils. This is like asking Rep Issa to hire for Planned Parenthood or asking Rep Barney Frank to hire for Freddie Mac. It is insane and absurd, not to mention stupid.

Rep Laine with the help of the only Black representative in Minn House, Rena Moran decided to make the duties of the ethnic councils from must to shall advice the governor, shall advice the legislature blah blah and BS. Shall and may basically mean “your advice will fall on deaf ears and blind eyes”. To make matters worse Rep Moran who is African American either did not comprehend the affect of this legislation or is simply a DFL butt kisser. Rather than speak for her constituents – Rep Moran chose to speak for MN DFLers whose districts have some of the worst racial gaps in Minnesota. How sad and frustrating to have one Black legislature in Minn House and she turns out to be a disappointment.

The Senate version was authored by Sen Pappas – her version did not pass committee. Pappas is usually all about bowing to Sen Bakk – you know the majority leader who speaks for everyone except Black and Brown Minnesotans and his whipped majority leader – Sen Hayden. Can we please defeat and vote out Hayden and Moran next year – seriously what is the point if they don’t speak for us. Where was Gov Dayton in all of this – he was too busy fighting to save the state auditor’s power. Yet, Black Minnesotans voted for him overwhelmingly. In other words, if Dayton was not on board with this – he would’ve threatened a line veto. We all know he likes his veto pen.

Where was NAACP & Mpls Urban League – sleeping as usual. When do they ever fight or advocate for policy changes at the Capitol.

In sum, if anyone ever wondered why Minnesota has some of the worst health disparity, highest education gap, highest unemployment for Blacks so on and so forth – wonder no more and vote out the following legislators who are responsible eliminating the only independent Black voice we had in Minnesota.

 The ring leader Laine

• ; Moran
• ; Anderson, S.
• ; Mullery
• ; Mariani
• ; Runbeck
• ; Howe
• ; Cornish
• ; Ward
• ; Nash
• ; Pugh
• ; Fischer

They clearly take their minority votes for granted and could care less about any racial gap or disparity.

Above words do not represent any candidate, committee or agency

Idil – Somali Autism Mom & Minority Advocate

Alright – so, once in a while ok a lot, some politician says something so hurtful yet so true to their heart. Rep Newberger who is a Republican from Becker recently during House transportation policy debate said what his heart and mind were thinking “Boy, wouldn’t that be convenient, to have that rail line going from the prison to North Minneapolis”.

Please read that again, an actual Minnesota law maker saying that out loud. You can’t make this shit up. Clearly, this was no accident and Rep Newberger was thinking about this in his mind. It is just that his mouth said it before his mind can catch it.

Rep Moran who is usually mute when it comes to racial injustice as she was in so many autism bills spoke up. She told him off in a Minnesota nice way. I just wish, as the only Black legislator in Minnesota house – Rep Moran actually wrote bills and policies that fight and eradicate racial injustice. Sadly, she rarely writes good bills that have any lasting effects or produce positive results.

Plus, Rep Newberger wasn’t talking about structural racism, he is sadly just a racist legislator who said what his mind was thinking. And, when the state health department put the words “structural racism” in their report over a year ago, it was because that is what the people they talked to were telling them is one of the problems health disparity exists in Minnesota. Furthermore, health disparity exist because Minnesota department of health could care less. Oh sure, they talk a good game but they rarely have policies to match their empty words.

In other words, MDH talking about or caring about racial health disparity is oxymoron. MDH policies do the opposite of addressing racial health disparity.

Above words do not reflect any agency, candidate or committee

Idil – Somali Autism Mom & Minority Advocate