State lawmakers from both sides of the aisle will be holding a public meeting Thursday night at Buckley City Hall to react to a preliminary recommendation by state-hired consultants to phase out Rainier School by 2017.

The consultant's final report is due Oct. 30.

And let me take this opportunity to correct an earlier posting. All of the residential habitation centers for developmentally disabled would take a hit under the consultant's recommendation, even Fircrest School in Shoreline. But Rainier would be closed.

Representative Hurst hosts town hall meeting on Rainier School
Hurst: 'We must fight to keep the Rainier School open'

BUCKLEY -- At 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, Oct. 22, Representative Christopher Hurst (D-Enumclaw) is calling together a public meeting to mobilize folks in opposition of the draft report recommending the closure of the Rainier School.

This recommendation will be transmitted soon to the Governor and the Legislature, and it’s critically important that both understand the unequivocal opposition to any such closure.
“I couldn’t disagree more with either the recommendation or the methodology behind it,” Hurst said. “The people that wrote this report used it as an opportunity to further an ill-advised and thinly-veiled personal agenda to close all of the state’s RHC’s. They just don’t get it. The RHC’s provide a service to our most vulnerable citizens that cannot be safely replicated in any other venue.”
The Rainier School has, for years among society’s most vulnerable citizens, been a safe and secure setting, and there is a waiting list to get in.
"Closing this school would be neither smart nor compassionate," Hurst said.
According to the draft report, there are no initial cost savings to closing the Rainier School. At a time when state resources are extremely scarce, it would cost the taxpayers as much as an additional $1.6 million a year to begin the process of relocating the residents back out into community settings where many would be ill-equipped to survive.
“This is a call to action,” Hurst said, “and people’s voices need to be heard.”

WHAT: Town hall meeting to discuss report’s call for the closure of Rainier School
WHEN: 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 22.
WHERE: Buckley City Council Chambers, Multipurpose Room, 811 Main Street, Buckley
WHO: Representative Christopher Hurst, Representative Dan Roach, Buckley Mayor Pat Johnson, and other elected officials. All interested people in support of the Rainier School are encouraged to attend.

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