TRANSCRIPT

Matt Dunn: Welcome to Studio 42, I have a special guest today, the director of Emergency Communications of Hamilton County, Andrew Knapp. Andy, welcome.

Andrew Knapp: Good morning Matt, good morning. Thanks for having me.

Matt: Good to have you, no thank you. We invited you and you accepted today because we want to talk about some of the emergency communication available to people with neurological or physical disabilities. Should they live alone or even if they don’t, how they can reach out to 9-1-1 or any number and receive emergency response. Whether it be for a medical emergency, fire, or even just to report a crime. We know that there are various special services available that you offer, because we have folks that maybe cannot communicate like others, and it enables them to be able to transfer information. I just want to hear from you about some of those services and about the 9-1-1 program here in Hamilton County.

Andrew: Sure, well I appreciate the opportunity, thank you very much for taking the time to hear about our industry. And I say our industry in that, I’ve been in the 9-1-1 business since 1988, started as a call taker dispatch and I’ve worked my way up the ranks to the now, the director role in Hamilton County. We cover the entire county of Hamilton, a little over 480 something square miles, 806,000 residents. And there are what we call PSAPs, or public safety answering points. Within Hamilton County, there are two primary answering points, which would be ours, the Hamilton County Emergency Communication Center, and then the City of Cincinnati. Outside of that there are some smaller centers but we take the majority of the 9-1-1 traffic as it comes in first and then process the calls. When, when a person’s calling 9-1-1, you know, we think of 9-1-1 as being this number that’s been around forever, and it’s a universal number. But the reality is that it really only started here in our region in August of 1988 so it hasn’t been around for, you know, long long periods of time, but we’ve all grown accustomed to it and we depend on it to work and work reliably regardless of where we travel. So over the course of time, you know, we’ve evolved our technology to try and include technology that is specifically useful for certain types of demographics and certain types of groups that have different types of needs. And in this particular application, as we’re speaking about people with, with–with special needs that may not have complete mobility, may not have the complete ability to hear and speak. We have a variety of offerings that–that technology, just like I’m sure they’ve seen their life changed with technology that the lives of us in the 9-1-1 industry also have changed. To talk about where we operate for within Hamilton County, it’s basically the 48 municipalities outside of the city of Cincinnati. But one thing I can assure people is that we have a coordination of all the 9-1-1 centers throughout the state of Ohio. And quite frankly, we know that we’re in a tri-state area, so there is significant coordination, even in the statewide basis between Indiana and Kentucky. But within Hamilton County, I serve as an appointed position that’s called the 9-1-1 coordinator for the county, and so I’m the one that’s responsible to make sure that everybody in our county has the same exact access to the same exact type of technology and service. We work very hard to do that. Let me know, like, kind of guide me where, where we want to talk about technology, where we want to talk about access to it or, like we started, the basics.

Matt: Sure, so ironically, here at TruCare, we actually do provide services throughout Ohio. A majority of our services are provided at Butler, Warren, Clermont, obviously Hamilton County. So the people that would come here for our adult day program are from all four of those counties in southwest Ohio, but they all pretty much would follow the same protocol and calling 9-1-1 or emergency services. For those folks who cannot necessarily speak clearly or don’t speak at all, how can they relay communications to your staff in a time of an emergency?

Andrew: That’s a great question, and it’s, I appreciate knowing what your service area is. One thing I would say to the people in the service areas there is most likely, if I were to ask a random person on the street, hey, can you name the 9-1-1 director for your areas, they would probably draw a complete blank. If you don’t need it, you don’t need to know that but nonetheless, before I ask you, do you expect to be able to call 9-1-1 where you go? Of course. Everyone does that. One thing I’d like to say to those people that are outside of Hamilton County areas and I personally know each one of the directors for those regions and can tell you that without any hesitation, that you have access to probably some of the best 9-1-1 technology and the 9-1-1 training and the personnel behind that bar none from anywhere else in the country. We have certain minimum training standards within the state of Ohio that everyone must adhere to, and as a result, that has really leveled the playing field for what type of service you’re going to get. So when you call 9-1-1, regardless of where you’re at in those, in this service area for TruCare, you’re going to get a trained and experienced professional who’s going to be able to give you, not just answer the call and make sure somebody gets to you, but they’re going to be able to give you pre-arrival instructions, things that can help you to provide some very basic first aid prior to the arrival of EMS. Another good thing about the area that we live in is we have an incredibly fast response time. Almost everywhere within the area you provide, has a four to six minute response time. And while some areas within the concentrated, populated areas of Hamilton County, it’s even less than four minutes. So we’re very fortunate that we, you know, in general, have a very quick response time to kind of gauge the conversation related to people that have communication difficulties or that cannot speak or cannot hear what we have available to us is a combination of things. There are, as I’m sure you’re aware, there are translation services, or there are the relay services, the Ohio relay service for example, where you can make contact with them and they’ll call us to tell you know what you need. Sometimes you may have an emergency that doesn’t allow you the discretionary time to try and make contact with the relay service to make contact with us. And in those cases, you can text to 9-1-1 and when you text 9-1-1 it’s very simple. You start the text as you would start it to anyone else. And most people don’t have 9-1-1 as their contact in their phone, so just simply put, you know, to in the To field 9-1-1 and then write the message that you know of, of what you need and what’s going on. And that will be, you know, we receive those text messages.

Matt: So does that? How does that get directed to you? If like, if I’m in Hamilton County, why does it know to go to you versus Clermont County?

Andrew: So within cell phones is a location technology that actually within the cell phone network I should say, that recognizes the geography from which that call is coming. You know we drive up and down highways all day long and past cell phone towers and really don’t think much of it, but those cell phone towers are all located within a database. That database then has a geographic boundaries of what areas are serviced by those cell phone towers. So at minimum, we know the location of the cell phone tower the call came in on, and based on that, it’ll route it to the appropriate 9-1-1 center. Take a step higher, every phone, if it is a more modern smartphone. And in today’s world, to be honest with you, most of the legacy type of phones are being slowly but surely retired so, but I understand the elderly–some elderly folks appreciate a very simple, a flip phone, very, very minor, you know, no apps and things like that, those will still text to 9-1-1. We may not just get the exact location on a cell phone, a modern smartphone type cell phone, we’re getting GPS coordinates that are accurate within 10 to 15 feet of where you’re standing with that phone, depending on your access to the open sky, and GPS signaling on a text message, we may or may not get the exact location coming with the text. Again, there’s a lot of factors that–that depend on, you know what information we’re receiving as to whether or not we get the GPS.

Matt: Okay, so speaking of GPS, longitude, latitude, so let’s say I do not have the ability to speak. I do text 9-1-1, it originates there in Hamilton County communications and comes up on your screen, your call taker. So based on those coordinates, that does it then place the coordinates on a map so that you know where you’re going to respond to that? Is that how it works?

Andrew: Yes, and so we’ll see a dot on the map if you will, or a pin whatever you want to call it and that pin then corresponds to a what we call a dispatchable location. It will give you the nearest address to that particular dot or pin. The challenge becomes for folks that live in rural areas that are well off of a roadway or a highway or what have you. Or, you know, I live in a cul de sac, for example, that backs up to another street, and if I happen to be in my backyard, it’s going to pick up the address of the street behind me. I mean, so while the technology is very good that human interaction is really what we need to speak to someone to get your address.

Matt: And so, okay, so speaking of that, okay, so it would behoove anyone, whether you’re able to speak or not, to know the address of where you’re at.

Andrew: Yes, absolutely.

Matt: And if it’s a larger property, such as you speak, where exactly on that property they are and with what location within that dwelling, so that they know where to go. If you’re in a medical emergency, you can’t even move right. You’re gonna be able to, you’re gonna have to articulate that to get people to you.

Andrew: Exactly. And as we talk about, yeah, you know, mapping, and we talk X, Y coordinates, there’s another coordinate in there called the Z coordinate, which is your elevation. Some cell phones do report the elevation, but really, the elevation to us doesn’t necessarily correspond with them. I’m on the first floor, second floor, third floor. So think of high rises. Think of being in a hospital. Think of it being in a large facility, you know, hotel where, you know, we don’t know what floor you’re on. So as you look at a map, we’re looking at a 2D map that shows, you know, we’ll pinpoint your location fairly accurately. That elevation, however, really doesn’t, doesn’t necessarily correlate directly to us on–in a high rise building. So it’s important to especially for those folks, maybe have a caregiver that comes in, and then the caregiver is a person who visits, you know, I don’t how many, but 10 or 15 patients a day, they I wouldn’t reasonably expect them to know every single address they’re at, but they need to know that address when they when they need to call for EMS. And in one of the things, if you think about it, when, when are you gonna call EMS? I don’t know in an emergency.

Matt: Yeah, for sure. And you know, for that matter, if you know you have a medical problem and maybe you’re visiting someone, have them place that out on a piece of paper, on the kitchen cabinet, on the refrigerator, if they’re going to leave you at home alone, have it written down somewhere, just in case. I mean, think ahead, right?

Andrew: And that’s the same thing. A lot of folks are traveling, and they stay with resident or stay with other relatives or friends that they’re not familiar location. So while, again, we can, we can pinpoint with–with reasonable accuracy, it’s always helpful to know the dispatchable address to that. So, you know, a simple sometimes, if people don’t know their address, you know our call takers are asking, can you find a piece of mail laying around. I mean, everybody gets junk mail, so there’s plenty of junk mail. Can you, can you, can you find a piece of mail? But really, to be better prepared that the great thing to do would be to have that on a laminated or, you know, just put it in, into a sheet protector of some sort, and have that address somewhere, you know, bond on the refrigerator or on a common area where the phone is at.

Matt: Some homes still have the address on the mailbox out front. Maybe they would know to go out front immediately and look at the mailbox right if all else fails, maybe in an intersection, we kind of joked before we spoke today about, you know, giving a generic location like Kroger’s. Well, I mean, there’s 40 to 50 Kroger’s right in Hamilton County, and that’s not going to get police and fire to your location.

Andrew: No, exactly like we were talking about, if I were to tell you I’m just down the street from the intersection where UDF and the BP station are right by Dunkin Donuts. I mean literally, that’s dozens of intersections throughout–throughout the region. So knowing your dispatchable address now, without getting too highly technical, but another–another thing that we have access to, that many people have never even heard of, is a system called What 3 Words. So you alluded to mapping coordinates earlier and and we’ve all seen these mapping coordinates. You know where that’s the latitude, the longitude. It’s very detailed. They we went to a decimal based system, where it’s a little bit easier. But if I were to tell you I’m at minus 84 dot, you know, 38333, and 39 degrees point 056666, yeah, you’re lost. So another company has mapped the entire world in 10 meter squares is called What 3 Words. You can download an app that’s called What 3 Words. So if you are in a location that is somewhat rural, that’s off of–off of a main road that’s in the middle of nowhere, it’ll create a What 3 Words. So in the words will be very simple, like, you know, table bottle stand and, and we type in table, bottle, stand, and boom, it puts us right where you’re at. So the user can have this app on their phone, and they can find their What 3 Words we can correlate to what 3 words to where you’re at. Responders, actually, we use them. And you may think, well, when would I ever need this if I’m not a dispatchable location? We have a lot of canoe rentals, kayak rentals that are scattered throughout the county, and these folks are on canoes and kayaks, and, you know, just floating down the river in the middle of nowhere. And so rather than trying to say, Hey, I, you know, I put in up here, I was supposed to take a four hour canoe trip, an hour into it, yeah. So with this, what three words, we can pinpoint within a 10 meter by 10 meter square of exactly where you’re at. So again, what three words? It’s an–it’s a free app. It’s in, I would say that almost all 911 centers in this area now, are even using the What 3 Words, we use it a lot, lot more for, think about it. And you know, I’m in a parking lot of Kroger, just like you talked about those, those parking lots of some of the superstores are rather expansive and cover many, many acres. And rather than saying that, you know, if you look at the last s and the word Kroger’s on, you know, on this aisle down at the end, you know, you we go to what three words, and boom, there you are.

Matt: So most of the folks listening don’t even know that you and I worked together as dispatchers back in the late 80s, early 90s. So we’ve seen the technology change quite a bit, from the MDTs that we use to 9-1-1, so, how we know from our experience that the best response is planning ahead. Sure, and one thing that people can do now is enter their personal and medical history in certain files that will be accessible by dispatchers.

Andrew: Yes, there’s a variety of methods in which you can pre-plan the need for EMS. And I think that you know, the folks that you work with may be actually a little more prepared than what the–the average everyday person is. Most people go about their lives, never expecting to even have contact with 9-1-1 whereas the folks that–that you operate with know they have certain medical needs and the need the ability to quickly establish, you know what it is that they have going on. So there’s a couple of different ways that you can pre plan this information. One is, we participate with a program called smart 9-1-1 and it’s very simple. If you go to smart911.com you can fill out an online safety profile. In fact, when you go on to that–that smart 9-1-1 website, you put in your address, and it will tell you if smart 9-1-1 service is available in your area. So I can tell you that it is a nationwide program, and hold that thought, because we’ll get to that here in a minute. But when you put a basic profile in there, when, when traditional 9-1-1 started, when 9-1-1 was in at the end of the day, 9-1-1 is, is a phone number, and the 9-1-1 industry has to consistently try to ebb and flow with the needs of the society and the needs and demands of technology, if you will. But when it all started, it was a phone number, and really it was a phone number that was–that went to a phone that was plugged into a wall at a specific location and specific house. So you called 9-1-1 we got the phone number. And if you remember the early days of 9-1-1 we got just the phone number enhanced 9-1-1 came along, and that gave us the address, and we thought that was the greatest thing in the world. Well, fast forward to where everyone’s got a cell phone on their hip now, and that–that cell phone, while it may provide us with the location of that phone, it doesn’t tell us who owns the phone. It doesn’t tell us who’s the responsible billing party. It gives us zero other identifying information. So with smart 9-1-1 you can register your own profile. That profile can include what we call your landline phone. So if you still have a traditional cell or, I’m sorry, a traditional wire based landline phone in your house, you can register that phone. You can subsequently then register the individual cell phones that are contained within that household. So when you call 9-1-1, and this is the only time that we can access this database. Obviously, folks are worried about their own individual privacy. We completely respect that. So while I know some people would be a little nervous about giving the government any information, really, you’re not giving it to the government, you’re giving it to, to an independent third party that–that we contract with to maintain that data, and I can tell you that their security is absolutely top notch. U.S. based storage. I mean, so we’ve got, we’ve vetted that out in that you can put as much information as you’d like in there. You can put as little information in there as you like. I always try to target the–if you think about a family that has three or four children who are going to various high schools. If I get a 9-1-1 call from a–from a random cell phone, I can tell if–that I have the phone number to it, but I can’t tell is that–is that an adult’s cell phone? Is that a child’s cell phone? Is it a teenager’s cell phone, whose cell phone is it? Whereas if you register that phone in advance with a smart 9-1-1 system, and it does call 9-1-1 we have more people and more resources, and we could say, Hey, we got a 9-1-1 call with, with no voice contact to this number. You know, your profile says that’s one of your phones, or is there something going on? Or do you know where they’re at, and it can help us to help you find a loved one who may be in need. So with–with a smart 9-1-1 profile, it really accelerates that, that transfer of information of what’s going on, and allows us to help, you know, help you in a much more expeditious manner. In addition that–the responders, now, again, keep in mind that we’ve said, you know, I said earlier, that we have a four to six minute response time in most of our area. So responders do have access to a link that when you make that 9-1-1 call, and it has a smart 9-1-1 profile, we can send them a URL that for a very short period of time, they can call up your profile most often, I would say that people are on the scene quicker than they can get to a URL on their computer. So, but nonetheless, it’s a–it’s a good start. In addition to the smart 9-1-1 profile that you can create, again, it’s a free service. You need just go to smart911.com in addition to that, almost every manufacturer of cell phone has some type of emergency contact information within that cell phone. So whether you have an iPhone or Android, and those are the two primary operating systems that I’m familiar with, both of those systems have an emergency contact section in the iPhone, for example, you go to your health section, you can fill out, again, as much information as you want, or as little information as you want, but the more information you have in advance, and if you were to suddenly pass out or have a sudden cardiac arrest, when that information comes into us again, that phone has to make the 911 call, then we see that emergency contact data at the communication center, and it’s very helpful for situations where you can’t Speak on your own behalf.

Matt: For sure, for sure.

Matt: So with all the new technology that is out there with regards to communication, public safety communication, I would say, give us the five most important things that people need to consider when communicating with public safety.

Andrew: I think, if I were to quantify that, I think, first off, call sooner, like, you know, don’t hesitate to wait. I can tell you, you know, without hesitation, that the responders that we have in our area care about the community that they, that they operate in. Oftentimes, the responders live in the same communities. So don’t delay things. And this is coming from a guy who had a heart attack and waited hours and hours and hours before I, you know, went to the hospital. And in hindsight, you know that amount of time you get you can never replace. So if you think you’re having a problem, don’t hesitate to make the call sooner rather than later. The next thing when you do call would be to try to be as aware as you can about a what I we call in the business a dispatchable location. So what is the address and where it becomes even more complicated. There are areas where a street may have multiple names, and so be aware of what the three names are. If it’s normally called, you know, I’m just going to use us 42 but sometimes it’s called, you know, Sharon road. Sometimes it’s called Lebanon road. Sometimes it’s called Reading road. You know, be aware of where you live and what the accurate probably the best thing to say is, with the put the post office. You know, if you’re going to mail a letter, what is that address? Also make sure you know your–your telephone number and a way to call back. So, you know, technology is not completely perfect, and so in–in the 911 industry, once we get the address, we, you know, we find out what, you know, what’s the nature of the call, you know, what is the address? And we ask, what’s the nature of the call? Mainly, do you need police, fire, EMS? Then we’re asking, Where do you need it? Then we’re going to say, if I lose contact with you right now, what is a way for me to get back in touch with you? So that’s the phone number. And so I would say, you know, again, call–call sooner than later. Know the address, know the phone number, and then you know, a brief summary, if there’s something that is an unusual access so I’m in an apartment that’s around the back of the building, if there’s a separate, you know, location for you to get in, into the building. And then are there other certain parking considerations? Keep in mind that when–when EMS and fire and police are responding, they’re bringing in, most cases, very large vehicles. And so if there’s something that–that’s going to inhibit their ability to get to you. You might want to know that off the bat, but I think those are the top five things that I would recommend.

Matt: And the situation’s already, it’s stressful, right? So the person calling probably thinks I need to get off the phone. I need to get back or whatever the situation might be. They need to take their time, right? Speak clearly and try to explain what’s going on, because that helps fire, police. EMS prepared what equipment to bring the necessary equipment to help them?

Andrew: Yeah, and a lot of times the call taker from the 911 side of things is going to say, tell me exactly what’s going on. Tell me exactly what happened. Tell me exactly what you know, what you need. And–and so also, I would let people know that in most of the dispatch centers that we operate with, most centers have a two tiered type of response on the call taking side of things. And what I mean by two tiered is that there may be a call taker and a dedicated dispatcher, so the person you’re speaking to, you might think to yourself, hey, stop asking me these questions. Just get them here. Well, the reality is, most of what we monitor is a particular metric that we look at. We monitor what’s called a processing time. The time from the call is the call is answered until the call is dispatched. And in order to facilitate as quickly as possible, a call taker is a dedicated call taker. They’re–they’re typing, you know, the information into a computer that’s being transmitted to a radio dispatcher. So just because you don’t hear anything happening, and you don’t hear them talking to what you think would be a fire EMS or police officer, chances are, help’s on the way. Yeah, help’s on the way. Someone, someone else is doing that. And so one of our protocols will say, we are dispatching an ambulance, we are dispatching fire. Would you like to stay online for additional medical instructions and–but most people don’t hear that, and understandably so, we–we know that the callers we’re dealing with are in a highly charged emotional state. We do our best to to recognize that and address that, and the way we address that is through most of the call takers will will continue to lower their voice, or lower the or slow down their speech, rather than, I’m not going to yell at someone and say, you know, tell you to you need to calm down. That doesn’t do anything. So we use slow repetitive, you know, this is what we’re trained to do. It’s a slow down, like, help me to help you. What is the address? You know, where are you located? What is going on and in by doing that and drawing the attention, rather than this constant escalation of things, everyone’s been in some type of an argument, and, you know, I raise up a little bit, then you raise up a little bit, then they raise up. And so we specifically train our folks to not do that and to do this. Persistent repetition is what we call it.

Matt: De-escalation.

Andrew: Exactly.

Matt: Okay. Well, I think those five tips are the best things that we can leave people with. I think everybody should be extremely proud of the 9-1-1, system that you are part of and the folks that work for you. And I’m excited to have you here today to speak to this and thank you for your time and thank you for your service, sure. And I, again, I would just tell our listening audience, you know, don’t hesitate to call 9-1-1 is there to help, and don’t delay. If you’ve got a problem, call it for the right reasons. You don’t need to test 9-1-1, it does work. It’s been proven time in time out for many years, right? But again, thank you for your service and thanks for your time today.

Andrew: You’re welcome, thanks for the opportunity.

TRANSCRIPT

Matt Dunn: Well welcome to the inaugural podcast for Studio 42 and TruCare Provider Services. We are very fortunate to have a special guest and also interviewers with us today. Our interviewers are Diana Mairose from Hamilton County Developmental Disability Services and Joe Hoefker, from TruCare and our special guest, Commissioner Driehaus. Welcome, thank you for accepting our invitation.

Denise Driehaus: I am delighted to be here. It’s very special to be on the inaugural podcast so I’m thrilled.

Matt: Just a brief synopsis, Commissioner Driehaus attended Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, and after graduating, Miss Driehaus owned and operated a couple of businesses. She was later a member of the Ohio House of Representatives from the 31st District. She continues to serve Hamilton County as the Hamilton County–as a Hamilton County Commissioner and President of the Commissioners. She has been serving since 2017. She is a resident of the Greater Cincinnati area and has two children.

Denise: That’s right, Sarah and Andrew.

Matt: Okay. So again, thank you for accepting our invitation.

Denise: Yeah, I’m thrilled to be here.

Matt: Um, we’re going to start off with some easy questions, so Joe, why don’t you start us off with your first question?

Joe Hoefker: What is your resource of your county?

Denise: What are the resources?

Joe: Of your county.

Matt: What resources, I guess, does Hamilton County have?

Joe: Yeah, Hamilton County.

Denise: For people with disabilities, yeah so, our primary resource is the levy. It’s the DD levy, it runs every five years and it has always been supported by members of this community. And so that is, a tremendous funding source, not every community has a levy for DD. And so we’re lucky to have that and we’re lucky to have citizens that support it.

Matt: Diana, go ahead.

Diana Mairose: Are there any active legislation or activity at the county level that will help improve the lives of people with developmental disabilities?

Denise: So we, one of the primary examples I can think of is what we did with our AARPA dollars at the Federal government. So we got money down, $158 million, which was a lot of money for the county. We allocated about $50 million of that for housing, and we said to ourselves, so we want do affordable housing, workforce housing, but we also have specific needs in specific communities for housing. And I have been through the LADD homes, when I was a state representative I went through a LADD Home, it’s these smart homes that allow people to live independently, that have disabilities but don’t need to be with someone 24/7 by way of care. And so we went through a LADD house, it’s a really great model out in Anderson Township and so we committed a portion of that 50 million to those kinds of houses, these smart homes. And so we’re building, I think it’s 38-units, of housing for people with disabilities with those federal dollars. We identified a couple other populations, namely veterans, seniors, people re-entering from the justice center. But this piece, this disability piece was really important to all three county commissioners. So that’s something that is very top of mind for me and we’re also doing other things that acknowledge that people don’t receive information in the same way as others. And so at all of our meetings you now will see interpreters, making sure that people who are, are hearing impaired have the ability to engage in those meetings. That started during COVID, when we were doing those daily briefings with Greg Kesterman and we always had an interpreter at those briefings, and we’ve just carried forward now into all of our meetings at the county. And we’re going to the State of the County next week–I should say I– I’m going to do the State of the County next week, on Wednesday, and we’re going to make sure that we have interpreters there. So I think it’s just a nod to recognizing that we need to do better in that space to make sure everybody has the ability to engage with the county.

Matt: So we talked about the generosity of Hamilton County voters in passing the Developmental Disability Levy. But in addition to that, something that helps that broader community is the SORTA Levy, the transportation Levy. Can you touch on how that benefits folks with a disability and, quite frankly, anybody in the county?

Denise: Yeah, it does impact everybody. There’s a lot of infrastructure money there, but there’s also a lot of money, three-fourths of the money I believe, going towards making that system more accessible in every way. So it is not only the large busses and the rapid transit routes, that’s all important, but they’re also expanding the more localized routes with the smaller vehicles to get people around their own communities. Something I’ve been working on for a couple of years is the access piece of SORTA, I’ve heard a number of complaints about access. It takes a long time for the vehicle to get there. You have to wait. It’s not convenient. And so we’re looking to make that better but also expand that service, so it’s not a curb-to-curb service, but rather what we call the through-the-door service. So sometimes people with disabilities, depending on what kind of disability it is, cannot get to the curb. And so we are trying to get metro to invest in a through-the-door services, so that people can have someone come out of the van, go up to the door, literally help them from their home out to the vehicle, instead of doing that curb-to-curb, because that just doesn’t work for everybody. Let me give you one example of that. I had a constituent. She was blind, and she didn’t know when the Access van was out there. She couldn’t see it, right? And so it was like, well, wait a minute. If somebody came and knocked on the door, she would know they were there. And so she brought this to my attention. It’s true for her and for people that are wheelchair bound and all the different things that you can think of. And so we’ve been working on this. Council on Aging is also part of the effort to get this going. And so we’re working on it. We’re talking to the board members over at SORTA to make sure that the transportation system that we all paid into, right, we all supported that levy, really does support everybody in the community.

Matt: I guess, not only do you have increased accessibility with that type of program, you have significant increase in safety and security for individuals that do have developmental disabilities. A lot of times they may be traveling alone, without the assistance of someone else, and they have that person who actually can physically help–give them mobility into the vehicle. It’s amazing. Huge increase in service.

Denise: So, yeah, it’s a different look, right? And it’s what I call the continuum. So you know, you go from everybody in this community being able to access public transportation, and it’s a continuum. People have different kinds of abilities, and so some people can jump on the bus and away they go. Others need access. There are others that need more than access. And so we’re just trying to finish out the continuum of access to transportation. And so the board’s open to it, but it’s complicated, and so they’re working through it, but I hope we can get there.

Matt: One of our goals at TruCare is to increase the community involvement of people we serve, getting them into the community. And transportation is definitely one of the biggest modes of getting folks out into the community. So that’s outstanding.

Denise: Well maybe it would be helpful for some of your members to advocate to the SORTA board.

Matt: Do you foresee or are there already scheduled public hearings?

Denise: They have public meetings. I don’t have that schedule in front of me, but I think it would be really helpful for them to hear from people that would be impacted by that expansion of service and how great it would be, and so I would encourage you to engage at the board level, yeah, and because transportation is such a huge issue for people with disabilities.

Matt: Joe, what’s your next question?

Joe: Yeah, what–what…

Matt: I’ll help him out, because he already told me what he’s going to say. He was going to ask you, what future legislation do you see over your next term, and how that might help people with developmental disabilities.

Denise: So I think that we are looking and trying to incorporate this lens for people with disabilities in all of our work, and it’s really access for us, and making sure that people have access to the supports through the DD Levy, as we discussed, making sure that people are aware of those supports, because I think that’s one of the biggest challenges. And then this other lens on, no matter what we’re doing, we are, we have the lens of access. So let me give you an example of that. It’s not as much behavioral, but rather, you know, broad access to some of our facilities, including the stadiums. And so we’ve got a project that is currently underway thinking about how to reconfigure that stadium. We need to make–we need to make strides when it comes to providing access to people with disabilities in that stadium. And it’s not only, oh, you get the seats that are left over up on the third tier, you know, on the–on the corner, it shouldn’t be that. It should be recognizing that people with disabilities should have the good seats along with everybody else, in addition to other seats throughout the facility. The other thing we’re thinking about doing, and we’ve talked about, is making sure that people with any kind of sensory issues, we’ve got spaces, calming spaces for them to go to, to kind of download or to regroup. And so those are the kinds of things that we’re thinking about when it comes to our facilities.

Matt: I think what people in our community might call that is Purposeful Engineering to make sure it’s already in place and not just fill in the holes.

Denise: That’s right, it can’t be the afterthought, right? It has to be a lens through which you look when you’re doing all things, and it’s really all things, and all–particularly buildings. We’ve got a lot of buildings coming online, and we need to pay attention to access.

Matt: Diana, do you have a question?

Diana: What–wait. Is there a county employee assigned a responsibility to make sure county facilities and parks are planned? Compliant with the most current ADA requirement? Is there someone to contact if there is a concern?

Denise: I love this question. That is not something I’ve thought about. But we, of course, are ADA compliant in all of our facilities. But what we’ve just been talking about takes it further than that. It’s so ADA compliance is one thing. People can access a building, for instance, or a stadium, for instance. It’s another thing to say, we want them to have the same experience as everybody else. It’s not just about that entry or that initial access, but rather that lens of, you know, how do we make that experience full and rewarding for everybody? We do not, to my knowledge, have one person that is in charge. We’ve got engineers. We’ve got people throughout all our different systems that are building these buildings or retrofitting the buildings. So I love this idea, though, that there is one person that somebody with a disability could go to and say, or an organization could go to and say, Hey, you’re the one that’s the expert here. Have you thought about this? Or have you thought about that? So I’m happy to carry that back to the commission. Let me say one thing about parks, because while the county parks are run by a board, and they hire their own executive director, so there is a levy that supports that as well. So that is not under the county commissioners. However, we have given funds to different communities as they built out parks to make sure those parks are accessible. So that, I don’t know if the park board, either at the city or the county, have someone that is solely committed to thinking through accessibility issues, but I think it’s a great idea. So happy, happy to carry it back. As I said.

Matt: Yeah, they’re on the heels of a levied passed, yes, doing quite a bit of changes in some of the county parks including Sharon Woods right here by us. Yes, I so a question I have for you, since my familiarity is with law enforcement, there have been some, several recent cases where a person with developmental disability has an interaction with law enforcement. Sometimes that doesn’t always go so well. You govern the sheriff’s office with the sheriff? Do you guys plan on implementing or have they implemented a training for law enforcement officers so that they are better equipped to interact with people with disabilities.

Denise: Yes, so I actually the county commissioners don’t have authority over the sheriff. She’s independently elected. We work in partnership with the sheriff. And I do think you know, it is confusing, I got that question just a couple days ago from someone, and so she’s independently elected, but that said, we work in collaboration with her, and I know she is doing training to make sure that there’s a sensitivity for not only people with disabilities, but people that are different from the person that’s the deputy, right? I mean, it’s diversity training in some ways, and diversity includes people with disabilities, and so she’s doing that kind of training currently. We had not seen a lot of that prior to her becoming the sheriff, and so I’m very encouraged by that, and we are supporting that. I mean, we the nexus between the sheriff and the county commissioners is we control the budget. So she comes to us with a budget ask, and then we are able to ask questions about that budget. And training is a really important piece of that. And so we can see through her budget that she’s committed to more training to make sure that people, whether they’re people with disabilities or simply people that are different, as I said, from the deputy, you know, involved in that interaction, that there’s some sensitivity there, and people don’t have gut, you know, just immediate reaction to something that they don’t understand. Because that’s often what it is.

Matt: It might be an individual who has behaviors and it’s totally perceived differently.

Denise: That’s right.

Matt: A person that does not have behavioral issues, and so they respond in their one and only way they’ve been trained and that is with some level of force.

Denise: Yeah, because they don’t understand that that person is acting in a way that is not threatening. It’s just a behavioral

Matt: Natural for them.

Denise: That’s exactly right. And so being able to see that and respond appropriately to that, I think, is what you’re referring to, and really key.

Matt: And you know, you can sit here and just look back, I’m of an age where I can see where the changes over the many years for people with developmental disabilities have been huge. They’ve made monumental strides in improving services for folks with developmental disabilities, but also individuals have gained respect, because people have learned that they are capable. They can live a measure on their own, with assistance, and one of those levels of assistance just happens to be technology and remote monitoring. Are you familiar with that type of service?

Denise: Well, that we’re back now. I’m back to the smart homes, yeah, which–which, to me, is all about the technology and being able to access technology in a way that allows people with disabilities to live independently as they get older. And so I know they started with a smart home that had all the bells and whistles in it, trying to figure out what was necessary, because it was very expensive to build. And so as you think through that, it’s like, well, could we have done this without this piece or this piece, but it was really important to have this piece, you know? And so, yeah, the technology has allowed us to do things really differently in this community. And to me, the smart homes are a huge part of that. But also, you know, all these other things, like you have the interpreters making, I mean, I had some business cards with Braille on them, just, you know, to provide additional access. So there are many ways to think through this.

Matt: So is your office, or the county commissioners, are they over County Developmental Disability Services?

Denise: We are in partnership with them. Okay, yeah, yes, it’s very confusing, isn’t it? I feel like I always need to kind of do the County 101, but we’ve got many departments underneath us, but many of the DD has its own board. I mean, a lot of these agencies have their own board, or they’re independently elected. Can I follow up real quick? Because something occurred to me about the sheriff. We have recently had some incidents in the community where de-escalation was necessary and a really important strategy. We saw that happen. De-escalation, though, can be used in a–what could be a potentially violent situation with individuals, or a situation that you were referring to earlier, where there is a misunderstanding about somebody’s behavior, and just to de-escalate is helpful in that environment. And so they, she talked a lot about de-escalation when we were talking about this other incident. So that’s another way to think about when you’re engaging with somebody with a disability, you don’t understand the behavior, and you’re trying to just de-escalate first so that you can better understand what you’re looking at.

Matt: And in fact, the skills of de-escalation not only help in interacting with folks with developmental disabilities, but just overall, all interactions.

Denise: 100%

Matt: For sure, for sure. So where I was going to go with technology is…

Denise: Sorry, if I got you off track.

Matt: TruCare Provider Services, one of the niches that we have isn’t necessarily building that expensive house that a lot of people can’t afford. Our niche is that we will go in and meet with the individual family, SSA, who is an advocate on behalf of the County, for the individual, and we make a determination, through an assessment, whether or not they can actually safely live on their own, maybe part of the day, the full day. And then our niche is we find the technology that actually enables them to do so, depending on whatever their diagnosis and physiological situation might be. And then we will make that match with the goal in mind that we’re helping them reach their personal goals, and we will acquire that, deploy it, train, transition to it, and then maintain a full cycle. Again, you spoke of earlier, and that’s our niche, but it’s in their existing home. Or if they’re in the position where they’re having to acquire a home, we’ll help them find that residence and then make it where they can live on their own. Now, a lot of times the model is hybrid, and as you know, there’s definitely some human resources issues right now because we can’t find all the help we need. So that’s where technology comes in and enables them to live on their own part of the time and then have that caregiver in the rest of the day, and that’s what we specialize in, in TruCare. So I guess what I would say is the reason I was recognizing Hamilton County DDS is they have had numerous expos where we can go and share with the public what we do, because sometimes a family has not considered allowing that loved one to move out on their own. Sometimes they, lack of a better word, they need to kick in the butt to make that consideration and realize, wow, my loved one is fully capable. Do you want to say something about that?

Denise: Yeah.

Diana: Yes, we do a couple sessions a year. It is called Futures Now, and we used to do it in person, and then COVID hit, and now we give the families the opportunity, and we have a letter of intent, which is not a legal document, but this is what you need to know about my loved one, in case one day they come home and mom, dad ran off, or are in the hospital, and it’s a start. You don’t have to legalize it. It’s

Matt: It’s not in stone, right?

Diana: It’s a start in the right direction.

Matt: So I want to remind people that you’re with your representative, Hamilton County development, Disability Services, so you know what you’re talking about.

Denise: Got her swag on so we all know.

Diana: But what’s really unique about this–this, we call it a training, but it’s not really a training, it’s connections, education. We talk about trust, we talk about the role of DD services, but the

Matt: The role of providers.

Diana: Providers and it’s a way to bring families together. And believe it or not, nine out of 10 chances the families are on the hall. They live 5-10 minutes apart, and they don’t even know it.

Matt: So I guess it would be important at this point to say that we’re not only are we fortunate to have the levy that we enjoy the benefits of but Ohio is actually a Tech First state, one of only about seven or eight states who’ve actually allotted quite a bit of money to allow the opportunity for a person with developmental disabilities to choose utilize technology, assistive tech, and also the services of a remote monitoring which we are one of only a few providers in Ohio. I haven’t advised you this, but we actually serve, we do remote monitoring and assistive tech in all 88 counties of Ohio. We’re not just restricting southwest Ohio, and there is a huge need for this service. And so it does fight the labor, restrictive labor issues that we’ve got, but more importantly, it is that catalyst for a family to consider allowing them to have their loved one live the life that they want to live,

Denise: Right. Well, I think that’s tremendous and hugely important. It’s a smart home, but a step down from that, because not everybody needs to be in a smart home, but rather, you can retrofit a home to accommodate somebody with a disability and allow them to live autonomous in that space. So I think that’s fantastic. It reminds me of what we do for seniors trying to keep them in their homes and just providing enough assistance, whether it’s a meal or doing laundry or whatever it is, you provide that assistance, they can stay in their homes, or in this case, move to a home where they just need that little bit of help to stay there. And not only is it best for the individuals, it is also cheaper for any government, state, county, the DD levy doesn’t matter. It’s a cheaper, more efficient way to address the need of the individual that doesn’t need the 24/7 but rather just needs a little bit of help. So it’s a fantastic model, and it really does serve the folks that are living in those you know, those places the best. And so I applaud– I think it’s a great, great move forward.

Matt: Well it’s definitely, it’s, it’s not so new. I mean, it’s been around for a few years, but it seems to be a growing way of thought for families, and it really does enable the family to be a stronger family, and the individual to seek their personal goals. It’s been quite exciting to see it from a provider standpoint, and to see it spread throughout the county and throughout Ohio. So Denise, before we end our broadcast, go ahead, you have something to say?

Diana: Oh, this summer is Americans with Disabilities Act anniversary, and we are planning a huge, we’re pre-planning. We’re planning a huge celebration in city of Cincinnati, and I and I just wanted to let you know and I just we don’t know what to look like yet, but we never want to have one, because

Matt: What month is that?

Diana: July.

Denise: Okay, that’s great.

Matt: So somebody could probably pay attention to the Hamilton County DDS websitem for more information.

Diana: Yes, March is Developmental Disability Awareness Month

Matt: Yep, it’s coming up.

Diana: We are having a live stream from Columbus in Cincinnati at our Kingsley office, 1593 Kingsley Drive from 9am to 12am all is welcome. We’re going to have speakers and we’re going to have a full agenda, and the best part is we’re for having Bob Evans.

Denise:Oh, nice.

Diana: So please come

Matt: So Diana. These are great events that help people come together under the same topic, which is developmental disabilities. What’s the website for your office so that people can learn more?

Diana: We just changed. My email..

Matt: Well let’s do this, they can learn more if they just do a search on Hamilton County Developmental Disability Services, and with that search, they can learn more about the dates and times and what’s coming up.

Denise: Can I–Can I just say from the county perspective, we will be glad to attend and offer a proclamation to celebrate the month or the day. I think we do the month. We’ve already done that. But if there is an event and you want the day proclaimed from the county, happy to do that. So let–just let us know. And you should ask the city do the same. We should all be celebrating the ADA, which was, you know, a landmark decision to recognize people with disabilities and treat them just like everybody else. So yeah, happy to participate in that.

Matt: Joe, do you have any additional questions?

Joe: Thank you for your good work.

Denise: No, thank you. Thanks for having me in.

Matt: Thank you for coming out for our inaugural broadcast. Your time. I know you have a busy schedule.

Denise: I’m very flattered that you asked me to be at the inaugural broadcast. And Joe and Diana, thank you for your questions. I really appreciate it all right.

Matt: Well, thanks again, and thank you for tuning in and stay tuned for future broadcasts again. Thank you from TruCare Provider Services, so long.

TRANSCRIPT

Matt Dunn: Welcome to Studio 42, from TruCare Provider Services. This is our second edition and I want to welcome our interviewer, interviewee. First off, a advocate for people with developmental disabilities, Kathleen Sheil, Kathleen welcome.

Kathleen Shiel: Thank you.

Matt: And the Director of the Adult Services Program at TruCare, we have Clarisa Leveridge and welcome to you.

Clarisa Leveridge: Hello, thank you.

Matt: So we’ve got a pretty full program today, and I want to go ahead and have Kathleen start-off with the first question.

Kathleen: Don’t mind if I do. So Miss Clarisa, what is your real name and your role that you play here at–uh–the ADS?

Clarisa: My name is Clarisa Leveridge and I have been the ADS Director going on two years now.

Kathleen: Wow, a long time.

Clarisa: Coming along yeah.

Kathleen: I like it. Um–What does the ADS stand for my dear?

Clarisa: ADS stands for Adult Day Support.

Kathleen: Um–where is the program–and where is this lovely Day Program located?

Clarisa: Our Day Program is located in Sharonville, Ohio. Um–we are right across the street from Sharon Woods, if you’re familiar where that’s at. And we do serve all four– of the counties here Hamilton, Butler, Warren, and Clermont.

Kathleen: And what days and times does the program run?

Clarisa: The program is Monday through Friday from 10AM to 3PM. Um, we start pick up routes as early as 7:30AM if you live far away, right Kathleen?

Kathleen: Uh-huh.

Clarisa: Or–uh–and the drop off routes end as late as 5PM also depending on how far you live out.

Kathleen: Nice.

Matt: So Kathleen, you participate in the program, right?

Kathleen: Yes I do.

Matt: Okay, tell us a little bit about it.

Kathleen: Oh it’s a really fun program, I’ve ne–I’ve never been–I’ve never really attended any bad day or organization in my life. Um–TruCare has brightened my life and um I hope that it will grow. And I hope that I will get to do different things that just help me with life. There are some of the staff here at TruCare that I feel I have gotten really close to, especially the Director. She’s one of my really good friends and she’s also very dedicated in what she does–um day after day. She always makes me smile.

Clarisa: Aww.

Matt: So if I were listening to you Kathleen, I guess I would want to hear what does your day typically include when you’re with TruCare, what–what do you do every week?

Kathleen: So we go on outings, um–just like any day program. But the main focus is, and their goal, is to do a little bit more, right? And to find their gifts and to bring that to the table but then again there’s more of like “I like this,” or “I like that,” so let’s see what we can do with that. Um–and so, and so, I kind of fulfill those gaps.

Matt: One of those gaps might be a unique opportunity like this in our podcast studio. Right?

Kathleen: Yeah, yes!

Matt: I know you and I have done a few interviews in our past together.

Kathleen: Definitely.

Matt: So this is exciting that we’re kind of rejuvenating that, that’s a good thing.

Kathleen: Yeah! Um–so okay–so what do we offer daily as options for participation?

Clarisa: So everyday for our Day Program we have three options. We give–the first option is to stay in the building, and if you do stay in the building, we have something called the Core 4 that we try to accomplish daily. The first one is a physical activity, something like low-impact workouts or seated yoga or a dance party maybe. And then maybe a creative activity like a wood sign or a how to drawing class or a tye-dye, right? Or third is a helpful activity like trash removal, general tidying of common spaces, or organizing our art room, because it’s usually a pretty big mess, right?

Kathleen: Uh-huh.

Clarisa: And our fourth Core 4 is an immersive activity, like journaling or our sharing is caring time or we have pen pals or we talk about current events. And our other two options daily are to go out into the community for a paid outing or to go out into the community for a free outing.

Kathleen: And what is the main goal of the–our ADA.

Clarisa: Our main goal here is to build lifetime–lifelong friendships and to build daily skills that last a lifetime.

Kathleen: How does one get signed up to start coming to the Day Program?

Clarisa: Good question. So the first step is to set up a tour with myself or really any of our staff here give tours. And then second would be to call or email myself and get an intake meeting set up with your state representative. Okay so your SSA would have to be involved and they usually do some paperwork and the third final step is final forms. So we have things like a Consent Packet, um–a revision to your plan, if there’s a behavior plan we need to know about, that kind of stuff.

Matt: Okay, so I know you’ve been here for a couple years um–share with me perhaps one of the most significant experiences you’ve had as the ADS Director.

Clarisa: Hmm.

Matt: Uh–threw you under the bus right?

Clarisa: Yeah that’s hard. I’d say, one that stands out big time is our softball games that we had last summer. We partnered up with Angels for Life and met, actually right up the street at Kemper Park and played softball with them and it was the most fun I think we’ve had all summer. They were a good crew, their staff were great too and there was a lot of laughing, we got into some water fights, it was really hot that day. It was just a lot of fun.

Matt: Cool, cool. You mentioned, you’ve always had a good day at TruCare, I guess rainy days aren’t very fun but–

Kathleen: Well no.

Matt: I think the most significant thing I heard you say and you touched on it was that you have a voice in what you do. It’s not just laid out for you. Can you speak to that? As to–do you remember when Clarisa came to you and kind of asked you what you’d like to do over the next 30 days?

Kathleen: Oh yeah! Yeah she was great. Um–Clarisa has inspired me so much and I really appreciate that and that will lie in my heart forever. The first time–when I started here at TruCare–um, I really didn’t know anyone until I got to know people, especially Kenny. He was like the only person I met–I knew. But then as I grew out of that and got out of my comfort zone I started to get to know people, especially a girl named Sohni, she’s dear to my heart even today. But no uh–but like Matt said, it is that, it is a way to get your–dreams and your hopes and your vision of just trying to fill different gaps and that’s one of mine.

Matt: Okay, cool. No I–I know you, and I know what you mean. And I know that the transition to TruCare, for you, was very successful and I know you’ve been enjoying the services we provide. Clarisa do you have anything else to add?

Clarisa: I don’t think so.

Matt: Remind our listeners how they can reach out, what the phone number is, if they want to look into possible services.

Clarisa: Yes, so my phone number is 513-360-8869 and that is my work number. And if I don’t answer, please please leave a voicemail, I always return calls.

Matt: That’s great. So this includes our program today. Our next program we will discuss remote monitoring and assistive technologies, but for now thanks for listening.

Clarisa: Thanks for having us.

Kathleen: Bye.

TRANSCRIPT

Matt Dunn: Thanks for joining the podcast for TruCare Provider Services. We are–we have a special guest with us this afternoon and I want to welcome Congressman Greg Landsman, thank you for accepting our invitation.

Greg Landsman: Thanks for having me.

Matt: Just–I’m going to give a little bit about you if you don’t mind. Congressman Landsman obtained his undergraduate degree at Ohio University and his master’s at Harvard University. He served as director of faith-based and community initiatives in the administration of Ohio Governor Ted Strickland. He has served as Cincinnati City Council Member and is now a U.S. Congressman representing Ohio’s first congressional district since 2023. Greg is married and has two children and is living in the Cincinnati Ohio area, so again thank you. We’re also accompanied by Tom Gugel.

Tom Gugel: Hello.

Matt: Tom’s here to help me ask some questions and Tom I’m going to have you start us off.

Tom: You want me to start-off with the first question?

Matt: Yes sir.

Tom: Thanks *laughs* okay Congressman Landsman, I’m a man who has–who happens to have a physical disability. What is the federal government to do to help me with my–to help me live my best life?

Greg: That’s a great question, I mean–I think every level of government should be asked that question and have a pretty good answer which needs to include a couple of things, one is: making sure you’re protected. That from your rights to your–your physical safety you know that you aren’t–that you are protected. Two: that the supports that–that you will need you know to have the best possible life are there. And I think that’s incumbent on us as a community government is where we do our sort of collective work where we invest our collective resources. And it is–should be–must be a value of ours collectively to invest in every single person in a way that allows that person to achieve their god-given potential and to live a robust life and that for some folks that’s a bit of an investment and for other folks that’s more.

Tom: Right.

Greg: But we all benefit when everyone participates at the maximum level, right? And you know, my mom was a special education teacher and she did it at every level: elementary school and then she was at the middle school and at the high school, she andI overlapped at the high school so I got to see her in action. She had, you know, a class of, you know, students with varying degrees of developmental and physical disabilities. And she was able to create a curriculum that worked for them that did just that, that brought out their god-given potential and helped them, you know, participate at the maximum level. That was something I learned early on as a young person, and the–the curriculum was, you know in addition to some of the basic stuff that they’re going to do at the high school, she–she sort of gutted the classroom and turned it into a cafe for the school that was run by her students and so her students got not only an opportunity to run the cafe and to learn those skills that allowed them then to go get jobs in the community which was the second half of the day, each of them in a different job. But they also were able to figure out “Okay, how do I sort of navigate this space,” physically and otherwise. How does the space need to be redone to–to allow me to participate. And it transformed the relationship the school had with her students where all of a sudden her students were no longer a group of kids that were sort of down this one hall, isolated, but because everybody went to the cafe. That was the cool thing to do, you could get the pass to go down to the cafe and spend a couple dollars. They became a big part of the community of the school and that was–that was a you know, a beautiful thing to watch, which was to see how much better people’s lives were that they had each other. That they were no longer separated and yeah, I think that’s ultimately you know, your government–or our government needs to do something similar, which is make sure that kids have or adults have what they need to–to participate at the maximum level.

Tom: Right.

Matt: Beautiful. Perfect.

Tom: Thank you. Next one? Okay–what legislation have you recently supported that helps support people with developmental disabilities?

Greg: So we made a list for you, I’m just going to read through them and then we can talk through. So in the last congress because this congress is new and we’re re-introducing bills, every congress if a bill doesn’t pass you got to reintroduce it if you want to and most of these will get reintroduced. The Diverse Cybersecurity Workforce Act. Autism Cares Act. The Safe Schools Improvement Act. The Tyler Clemente High School Anti-Harassment Act. SSI Savings Penalty Elimination Act, which is a big one. The Funding Early Childhood is the Right Idea Act, special education investing in early childhood. Latonya Reeves Freedom Act. Disabled Veterans Tax Termination Act. And these are a host of bills that strengthen disability rights expand access to education, employment, housing, public service-related opportunities that also include robust federal oversight.

Matt: Staples of living for sure.

Greg: Yeah, yeah.

Matt: So you mentioned legislation that would reduce penalty for maybe working like the STABLE, enable, Act are you familiar with that? Okay, does that enhance that or there was one that you mentioned that-

Greg: Yeah. It changes the threshold so that folks can work and it doesn’t undermine their–

Matt: Benefits.

Greg: Benefits.

Matt: Yeah perfect.

Greg: What I will tell you is, a frustrating thing for me because this is pretty basic stuff and the way congress is set up now, you can have, you need 218 people to say yes to something for it to pass. Or on suspension, 290, meaning that it doesn’t go through a committee you just bring it to the floor. You’ll have bills that have over 200, sometimes, over 290 that have these signatures the members of congress saying “I’ll vote for him” and because it–the speak doesn’t bring it to the floor either because he doesn’t want to or because he just, it’s-it’s–it just isn’t on his radar so it doesn’t come to the floor. And you know there have been attempts to change it but ultimately we either have to elect speakers who allow these things to come to the floor or you know change the policies so that the mechanisms, once you hit 290 it’s supposed to come to the floor. Once you get a discharge petition you get 218. The point is we have–we have to fix congress, we have to fix a lot of things in politics but this in particular, this is a bill that has broad support, there’s 350 people that vote for this bill. But getting it to the floor should not be that hard, that’s my point.

Matt: That was my follow-up so does it–does it enjoy general broad support or do you find it running party lines a lot?

Greg: I mean, I think it depends on the vote. I think when people talk about it, that is one where they’re like well, we don’t want to penalize work. And so it’ll have bi-partisan support rhetorically, at least.

Matt: Okay.

Greg: But it’s like okay well, it doesn’t really help us unless you pass it.

Matt: Yeah one of the big things in Ohio right now is to motivate community involvement any which way we can. And so enabling someone to live on their own with technology moves that direction. Have them come in and be a part of our adult day program like what we offer here, to where they’re not just sitting at home, maybe in a chair playing video games and watching TV and actually getting them out, involved with other folks in the community. That’s a huge push, and we do get a lot of support at the state level from that and most people know that a lot of those funds trickle down from the federal government to support those state initiatives. Okay, so–talking about legislation–so with all the changes occurring in Washington right now, how will people with developmental disabilities be adversely affected? Do you see some–some troubling times, some issues coming up?

Greg: Yeah, I mean across the board there are proposed cuts to healthcare and that includes Medicare, it’ll include Medicaid, and so it’ll affect everybody including individuals with disabilities. And so, you know, the louder y’all can be the better. I mean I will oppose these cuts, I want us to expand healthcare, not cut it. And they’ll say, “Well, we’re just trying to save money here,” or “we’re going to change this policy there,” and it does save money to put it back into healthcare. Like, you know for example, if there’s some Medicaid changes that they want to make and it’s going to save some money. I don’t–you know because there’s waste or something–fine, but then increase the reimbursement rate. Don’t take the money away from Medicaid. You know what I mean, so my whole thing is you know, we need to be spending more on healthcare for folks. Not less. And that’s a big difference between me and my Republican colleagues.

Matt: They–it seems like their effort is focused on trying to do good for all but yet there’s often, they don’t investigate all the smaller cases and there’s often a lot of collateral damage. Sometimes.

Greg: Yeah. Yeah, I mean look, if what they’re proposing in this current budget takes a trillion dollars out of the healthcare system, that will hurt tens of millions of people, including people with disabilities. I don’t know who benefits from that other than to look at the budget and say well, folks at the top are gonna continue to be in a position where they don’t pay all their taxes. That doesn’t seem like–that’s not worth it to me like they should pay all their taxes. But I know–everybody I know pays all their taxes except for you know the uber–the super wealthy in this country and I don’t know any of those guys but I’m sure they’re fine and they can pay their taxes.

Tom: Why should a–why should an individual with disabilities pay attention to the elections and how can they contribute?

Greg: Well this is where I think, like technology comes into play. More and more you know, being able to reach out to your elected official, you can send emails, you can pick up the phone, you can–we do a bunch of virtual town halls and teletown halls and you know getting on there, asking questions, being–being vocal, making sure that people know your story and what you’re–what you need. You know, you got lobbyists that come in and they–they spend a lot of time with elected officials telling them what they need so y’all shouldn’t– no one should you know be shy about this. Say like, “This is what’s going on in my life. This is what I need and–and it is important because ultimately it’s the politicians that make decisions about where the funding goes and who gets helped and who doesn’t and you know it’s ultimately people, you know you hope that you elect people that–that think about everybody and try to make at least the best effort possible to help everybody but oftentimes their people just, they get in there and the people who you know write them big checks you know. They–they get–they get more of their time and energy and ultimately they–they’re the ones that they’re thinking about when they write legislation. That’s not my–that’s not me. I don’t take corporate pac money for a whole bunch of reasons but this is one I just want to make sure that people always know that it’s their stories and it’s their needs that come first.

Matt: Well it does sound like a collective voice is truly needed right now for the folks with developmental disabilities and–and approaching funding. We’re very fortunate here in Hamilton County that we’ve recently passed a developmental disabilities levy. We’re very fortunate that we live in Ohio because we are a Tech First state and we’re seeing an increase in use of remote monitoring and assistive tech.

Greg: By the way, we’re just an incredibly wealthy country. I mean we just have so much wealth and it should not be concentrated among a few. I mean you know people work hard, you should be able to keep your money but we also live in a society where we’re wealthy enough where folks should be able to get what they need. Period.

Matt: So with regards, I–I know how things are kind of gridlocked at the moment at the federal level. What do you foresee, that you know, some sort of legislation that you would get behind over the next few years of your term that would help promote something for adults with developmental disabilities?

Greg: I mean I think there will be lots of opportunities, even though there is this gridlock and there’s a brokenness about politics. I do think that–well I know at least from my first term that there’s still a ton of work that gets done and I try to stay as “in the loop” and in the mix and–and–and you know in partnership with folks across the aisle so that I could be part of getting things done. Despite the fact that big picture there’s gridlock, it still doesn’t mean that we’re not getting other things done. I–I would like to see, first and foremost, everything that exists right now in terms of investing with people, including people with disabilities, not touched. And so my hope is that there’s enough pushback to the kind of cuts that are being pursued by the administration and then the cuts that are going to be proposed in this budget that it doesn’t happen. That people realize that we can get to a balanced budget without taking it out on individuals with disabilities or–or low-income families, kids you know who’s parents work but don’t make enough to give them–get them good healthcare, that it’s time to change the tax system. So that the people at the top pay all their taxes that I mean–you know it just comes down to those two things. You–do you want to start cutting, hacking away at all this stuff that people need or order to protect the folks at the top who have so much money. I mean the further–one of the things I’ve learned in this job is when you get out of Cincinnati, there’s like rich people in Cincinnati, but then like there’s people outside of Cincinnati, they’re just like, it’s billions. It’s just insane. You know which–if you think about billions you’re talking about hundreds of millions of dollars that they’re sitting on and a lot of those folks don’t pay any income taxes because of all the loopholes. So I–you know–it’s not me being political, it’s just those are the two options. You either cut stuff for folks who need it or you start making people pay all their taxes.

Matt: Well I know a lot of people would listen to something like this and whether it be you or someone else and say, “Oh, lip service, lip service whatever, whatever.” You know I’ve met you several times, I know that’s not the case with you and they say, “Well he’s always out talking.” Well, you got to get out there and talk and learn about what’s going on, so I have to tell you I appreciate you coming out today and speaking with Tom and I and sharing a little bit about some of the insight that you have and what’s going on right now and thank you Tom for–

Tom: My pleasure.

Greg: Yeah this was good.

Matt: And maybe if we’re lucky we’ll have you back.

Greg: I’d love it.

Matt: Alright, thanks a lot Greg.

Greg: Thank you.