John's usual--
It will be a quiet week around CLI spaces this week with the majority of CLI programs shut down for the week in order to give our staff the chance to relax with their family & friends. There will be a few of us around this week-- Swick, myself, Julie & Courtney. The Inter-Office Mail Courier will still be running-- as will our Community Employment Transportation service.
Independence day is a big deal for our county, obviously. However, it's also a big deal for the DD field. 2022 is the 32nd anniversary of the passing of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Independence is a key reason for CLI's services-- and Medicaid funding.
I know that this 4 day shutdown was an inconvenience for some people and I'm sorry for that. As I said in last week's one-call, we will be shortening our normal holiday break to compensate. We've been able to hire 1 new staff, Melissa Hlad, and we have another promising candidate in the pipeline. This should have a couple positive effects. First, it should enable CLI to allow our full-time staff to use their paid time off through the next year in 2023 without CLI having to close programs as much as it has in 2022. Second, it will allow CLI to expand the workshop's paid work program-- if anybody even wants to work anymore. Weird times. It's good money. The workshop pays $9.30 per hour for benchwork jobs these days. Lastly, it will enable CLI to expand our Therapeutic Day Program services to a 2nd community hub space. We're still working out the details, but we know that there are people who have significant medical & physical care needs who aren't being served right now.
So this may be a quiet week, but I expect that there will be plenty going on with CLI as we wind our way through the rest of the month. It's interesting times to be an adult service provider right now as Huron County and Ohio figure out the most productive ways to invest in people with DD.
One final sad note-- CLI lost one of our favorite people last week, Cathy Reineck. Cathy drove bus for the OG "Christie Lane" for years & years, before hiring on with CLI when we privatized away from HCBDD at the end of 2015. Cathy's positive attitude and big sense of humor were a blessing to everyone she worked with and everyone she worked for. I appreciate everything that Cathy did for me and for CLI. For those of you who knew Cathy, her visitation hours are Wednesday, July 6th, from 4pm-6pm at Walker Eastman-Heydinger Funeral Home in Norwalk.
That's all I have. Enjoy your week. Feel free to reach out to Swick or to me if we can be of service to you.
John
