Thank you vcuddy and Lalloo75, that would be most helpful. I'll pm you both for info.
Where in California? We live in Orange County..One of Justin's Lawyers is thru the Dayle Machinosh Center...His Lawyer does not cost us..they are put in place to monitor Regional Center..There is also Area Board 11....They are very helpful and can point you in the right direction...They are also there to monitor services for the disabled and are well aware of the "tricks" that Regional Center enjoys using. PM me if you want and I will give you the numbers and names..
Victoria..Justin's mom
I live in California too. Southern CA (Torrance). Our lawyer has a cap when it comes to dealing with school districts (max. amount I will pay him), but not so for Regional Center. Did u get an independent evaluation by a reputable child psychologist??? In our case, the Regional center accpted the psychologist's report without even doing their own eval. IM me privately and I will give u her name and number as well as the lawyer's if u want them.Any advice on how to handle the 1st meeting of the "Fair Hearing" process with the Regional Center? They refer to this 1st meeting as the "Informal Meeting" there can be 2 higher level meetings after that if we don't prevail.
DS was denied service b/c they found he only met 2 of the 5 or 6 criteria. I think he does meet criteria.
I cannot afford an advocate/lawyer presently, I hope I'm not making a mistake about that.
Its either spend the money now to possibly obtain service, spend the money on some things privately if we are denied or save the money for later when he will definately need it. All choices I hate.
Please help. Thanks.
Lalloo75
Thanks for the very pertinant information. We are looking for ABA.
I'll be looking at the web site suggested. Get to get away for a few days and will be bringing lots of reading material with me.
Thanks again
http://www.copaa.org/find/index.php
The link above will get you to a list of california atty's who are taking clients and who belong to this excellent professional org.
Be careful about getting additional evals thru the school. First, they may be biased. Second, "waiting for the eval" is a common stall tactic. Your child might end up losing valuable time. Get a lawyer/advocate NOW!
Good for you!!! Now I don't want to scare you, but be careful who picks the psychologist. Who r they giving you?? It is not a matter of getting a diagnosis, it is a matter of amount of services and ABA hours. Since they are the ones paying for it they get to see it before you!!! I know it is a lot of money to shell out, but when u pay for your own independent evaluation, u get to see what gets written and the recommendations before they get it. Just remember.... ask for the max. services!!! U won't get them, but at least, u have a hign negotioating point .... if u r asking for ABA... 40 hours + 12 hours of supervision (NOT A MINUTE LESS), and also have all the research to back u up.... Great website with resources and great meetings too if u can attend ..Well, the 1st meeting was held today, its called the Informal Meeting.
Its not that informal. the center director, our case worker, 1 neurologist, 1 pediatrition and 2 pediatric psycologists were there. Just a little bit intimidating.
But thanks to some of you for the help because this meeting went really well. We didn't have time for legal represnetation, however we were able to get our thoughts together and down on paper.
I gave them all copies and they let my say my stuff about our son. The neurologist finally told us, "you don't have to spent any more time convincing us there are severe issues here." He also recommended an evaluation with a very good child psyciatrist I've been trying to get an apt. with forever. "Its on our dime."
I feel so relieved that we weren't shut out at this meeting, at least they are going to do more evaluating.
It will give us time to get representation.
Thanks again.
Well my post got moved, so I want to bump it back. I really could use some help.
Please, please, please. Does anybody have experience with appealing a denial for services that are provisioned for under the Lanterman Act? The Regional Center is the same agency that provides services for Early intervention.
Thank You.
My son is 10. He is HFA and ADHD. He has learning disabilities, and is in Private school special ed. He attends speech therapy for expressive/receptive language problem. He has significant social/emotional issues in an unstructured environment. He has numerous sensory deficits and is in OT.
We pay for private OT. SD pays for ST and has improved the IEP offer this year that is about 1/3 of what he gets in private school. But that is better than before, b/c they were only willing to provide speech. We have not decided to accept their offer yet. There offer does not include psycological services, though paperwork documents he has issues in day care and at home.
He is in desperate need of behavioral intervention, which is why we petitioned the Regional Center to re-open his case. They closed it at age 3. Its been years in the process of the Autism dx. We cannot pay for private behavorial intervention.
Thanks. SH
Is there a medical diagnosis? How old is your child?
I believe that you can appear a denial of services under the regional centers, at least within the regional center. My kids are now past that age so I don't have much information.Thank you for your responses and links. I appriciate it.
Yes we do live in Ca. Now I know which direction to take. Next step-find an advocate/attorney.
Thanks a bunch. SH
You REALLY need an advocate/lawyer. The District will have a lawyer. Some states do not allow advocates in Hearings. Your District MUST give you a Procedural Safeguards notice. That will have all the rules in it. Go to www.wrightslaw.com and search Hearing and Procedural Safeguards and Mediation and Resolution Session. I'm afraid that in this legal proceding, you have absolutely no hope of prevailing without counsel.