Texas House Unanimously Votes to Reverse Cuts in Therapy for Disabled Kids
In 2016, deep cuts to the funding of Early Childhood Intervention program eliminated the essential help that Texas provided to kids with autism, speech delays, Down syndrome, and other disabilities. Due to those cuts, several partners and vendors that participated in the program had to leave. We are talking about companies that make and maintain specialized equipment and provide services exclusively for disabled children. They were unable to stick around when the funding dried up.
Yesterday, a ray of hope emerged from the darkened sky. The Houston Chronicle reports that the Texas House unanimously corrected this terrible oversight. The official vote count was 138-0 on House Bill 25. The crazy thing is that a measure that guarantees funding for the program wasn't added to the official list of funded projects, as Governor Abbot won't have the time to add it to the list of bills to consider soon enough. So, to make sure the program gets the necessary help to disabled children across the Lone Star State, lawmakers decided to pull $70 million from the governor's $110 million disaster relief fund. This will give the essential program 2 years worth of emergency funding, which should be enough time to arrange permanent funding.