Tom Romano

Recent Activity

• 

  Tom signed the petition | about 1 year ago

  Stop Comcast's Takeover of NBC/Universal -- It's a Bad Deal
• 

  Tom signed the petition | about 1 year ago

  Stop the crackdown on WikiLeaks
• 

  Tom commented on the article | about 3 years ago

  Handcuffed at School

  As one who has spent 27 years as a teacher of an autistic population that were teenagers when I began working and now are all approacking or have  hit age 50, I am concerned with the treatment of this autistic person.
     But most people do not realize that in the late 1970s and early 80s, tieing the autistic clients hands behind them with soft cloth called "poseys" and locking them in "time out closets" for 20 minutes, checked, and if their behavior had not improved, another 20 monutes....
      In essence, these seemingly Draconian practices where the norm ony 20-25 years ago. Today much more humane ways are used to control their violence toward other clients and staff and most importantly to themselves, SIB, has  made it harder and much more expensive to care for these people.
      I work with  some clients that need a minimum of 2 staff to work exclusively with them; some 3 or 4 staff. I have 27 scars from human bites as well as hundreds of injuries from punches, kicks and objects being thrown at me.
       I love these people like family and can not understand why after 3 years, our salaries top off. We did not even get a 2% cost of living increase last year. I make 1 dollar an hour more than I did in 1987! Most of our full time workers like myself are on some sort of state relief because our pay falls below the national poverty level. If I did not get my home heating oil paid by the state and recieved food vouchers from the city, I would not be able to sustain the lower income life I live.
        The quality of worker has gone downhill due to this and this, of course endangers the autistic clients. The government needs to address this before large state institutions again become the norm rather than the group home system that allows our clients much more care and love and integrates the families of our clients into their daily routines.
  .