Legal News

ELARC under fire for eliminating funding for autism treatment

By Richard Binder

Yesterday attorneys with Public Counsel and Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP filed a class action law suit and preliminary injunction on behalf of children with autism against the Eastern Los Angeles Regional Center.  The plaintiffs allege that ELARC illegally eliminated funding for a treatment known as "DIR," which it has provided, according to the suit, to mostly low-income children for over 10 years.

The members of the class were entitled to the "DIR" or Developmental, Individual Difference, Relationship-based treatment under California's Lanterman Act, which was enacted to prevent the institutionalization of developmentally disabled persons. In particular, the Act prohibits the unilateral termination of authorized and necessary services.

The suit claims that ELARC's termination of DIR is based on a misapplication of the so-called "Trailer Bill," which was passed by the California legislature last July, and prohibits Regional Centers like ELARC from, among other things, funding "experimental treatments."

Click here for details.

Full post as published by Legal Pad | LA on January 19, 2010 (boomark / email).