The state legislators will have blood on their hands if they cut health care for children with developmental disabilities. 
You heard about higher education budget cuts. Now children with disabilities face losing the Children’s Choice Waiver, which provides “supplemental support to children with developmental disabilities who currently live at home with their families or with a foster family,” according to the Department of Health and Hospitals.
The CCW is part of many other Medicaid programs in danger because of Louisiana’s more than $900 million budget shortfall for the year. Around 25,000 families with children with disabilities use state assistance to pay for health care, according to WBRZ. 
“These waiver programs offer supports such as respite care and skilled nursing so that they may be able to work and bring in an income to keep their family afloat,” said Katie Corkern, whose family uses the program to care for her son Connor. 
The program is vital because “individuals with developmental disabilities, especially if they are medically fragile, are often not eligible to attend daycare centers because of their great needs,” she said. 
Families need the CCW to help maintain financial stability. These families can’t afford to pay for their children’s healthcare costs. Regardless of your opinions of people using government assistance, taking away funding for these children is downright barbaric.
Kodi Wilson, whose son Braden has a rare neurometabolic disorder known as Leigh’s disease, said in an interview with WBRZ that her family will have to go on welfare if she stays in Louisiana. The family might lose its home and a car. The alternative is leaving the state, which many families with children with disabilities have already done. 
Corkern said losing the waiver would rock her family’s world. She’d have to quit her job to care for her son full-time. Her husband’s health insurance would cover Connor but wouldn’t pay for all of his needs. His  family will suffer massive amounts of debt for basic care for their son. 
Americans United for Life named Louisiana the “most pro-life state in the nation”, yet we are kicking out children with disabilities while our legislators subsidize episodes of “Duck Dynasty” to the tune of nearly $330,000 per episode, according to The Advocate.
Defunding the CCW wouldn’t even save the state money. According to The Advocacy Center, home-based services are optional under the state’s Medicaid plan but nursing-home services aren’t. 
By its analysis, if 55 percent of children with disabilities who used to receive the Children’s Choice Waiver opt to go to a nursing home, any amount of state savings would be null and void. 
Removing these life-saving services would leave families with no option to care for their children. Families who can’t afford a nursing home and live below the poverty line may have to place their children in foster care or risk bankruptcy,   according to Wilson.
Children with developmental disabilities don’t belong in a nursing home or foster care. They belong with their families, and the legislature’s irresponsible budgets over the past seven years shouldn’t separate them from their parents.
The budget already hasn’t been kind to children with disabilities over the past couple of years. According to Louisiana Developmental Disabilities Council, approximately 13,000 people in Louisiana with developmental disabilities are waiting more than ten years for the waiver services they need now.
Children with developmental disabilities deserve the financial support of our state. Legislators should care for the lives of children with disabilities over the film industry.
“They contribute to society through their love, compassion, laughter, and remind others who are so fortunate with their health and abilities to be thankful for each day. They teach us far more than we could teach them,”       Corkern said. 
The legislature needs to stop playing politics with the lives of children with         disabilities. Their lives are in jeopardy.