Some of the programs that we brought in,
some of the new concepts were
the community group homes— and the small ones
because there were large ones that had 20, 30, 40 people.
But we wanted to get that number down to a more manageable size.
We had a lot of problems with
neighbors protesting the establishment of these homes
a lot of problems.
And I was able, in my position,
to staff all the public hearings
that were required at that time
for any expenditure in the health arena
over a certain amount of money
and the group homes came under that domain.
So I was able,
supposedly in a neutral position, to give a lot of direction
and ideas to the people who were coming in
to establish these homes and to guide them.
Some of them didn’t know what they were really doing.
They had worked in one or two
and that was the experience.
I also had been very fortunate in being asked as a parent
one of two parents
to be on the rule committee that developed
the rules governing the homes’ programs
the community home programs
so I was always able to
influence those regulations.
And I knew them, and therefore gave
a lot of assistance to these people
who were starting these homes.