Minnesota Autism Spectrum Disorder Task Force created by state legislation years ago and has always met at least monthly and produced annual report to the Governor and Senate/House leaders has been on IDLE since summer of 2013. (No not American Idol and not my name of Idil, but IDLE meaning the do nothing committee)
Why? well in one name Rep Norton, the queen of autism disparity joined several months ago in the midst of last chair quitting because I asked equality. (God Forbid – we are equal here)
Rep Slawik was a member representing MN DFL House who is now a mayor of Maplewood left and we got Norton in her place. It has been down hill ever since then. The task force has accomplished nothing thus far for months, has failed to submit an annual by statue report end of 2013 and has not met for months now.
The new chair who represents DEED (MN department of economic and employment development) has not asked members to write any report, form sub groups, asked the open vacancies to be filled, set any meeting times for most to attend, and has been very laid back and carefree about autism.
And to think all of this because I asked MDH’s rep (not sure how she exactly got the job there – maybe nepotism) to include agencies of color and share HRSA autism grant that I advocated very hard in Congress and the White House back in 2011. Can you believe that?
The nerve and audacity of MDH and others who were not responsible and did not lift one finger or made one phone call to get Combating Autism Act (CAA) authorized which is how HRSA got the autism funds to deny equality and inclusion. There is not one other single person in Minn that has advocated as hard and made sure ALL 8 house reps and 2 senators voted and supported this bill than me. Yet, I can’t even ask for simple sharing of those resources for under-served communities. This is sad and unbelievable. Many here don’t even know what the heck CAA does, did and why it matters to autism. I kid you not.
These kinds of deliberate and bias tactics are exactly why MN has one of the worst health disparity in the country and why so many minority health issues take back seat. They don’t want to share the resources, they don’t want to include & they don’t want to listen to different ideas even though theirs have failed for years now.
As minorities, we have to fight for every little thing. This is so hurtful in so many ways.
In addition to all of this – Rep Norton’s arrival just made it worse. Remember this is the woman who wanted to take $25 million for the wealthy and take away from the poor in health and human services budget last year in 2013. How distasteful, Norton must be defeated in 2014 election.
I really hope things get back to normal and people realize thousands of MN autism families are depending on the work of this task force. There needs to be a line drawn between personal opinions and the charge at hand which is to create MN autism statewide plan.
There is so much to be done to play this childish game. I hope everyone votes based who they represent by following open meeting laws in MN and defend their vote or their comments. Instead everyone pretends to be inclusive while their votes are nothing but. And, if I hear one more time – I have a Black friend, I went to school with a Black person or I have a minority in my family, I am going to scream. That is soooo irrelevant. What is more important is how policies are shaped and by whom.
As usual above words are my own and do not reflect any committee.
Thanks!
Idil – Somali Autism Mom and Minority Advocate