That sounds like just another line in a government-related story, until you realize just what that means.
Children with autism, an isolating, debilitating condition, will no longer get treatment which allows them to grow into productive people who can interact on some level with those around them. Their families will spend more time and money taking care of their children.
People who work for those Crossroads-funded service providers will lose jobs, eliminating a source of income for their families.
Real people will be affected.
This isn’t a case of Crossroads being the bad guy. Quite the contrary, we believe the folks there are greatly pained at having to do this.
We do question whether those who receive the services are getting adequate notice — one family to be affected told The Mount Airy News they had yet to be notified by Crossroads, despite the fact that the programs in question will end Oct. 31. It might have been nice to give a 60-day, or even a 90-day notice to these people. It might have been equally nice to have given the provider agencies who depend on this funding more notice.
What would have been best, however, was if the General Assembly and the governor had taken a more responsible position on formulating a state budget. Those forming the state budget which cut the money to Crossroads used an old budget and snipped here, cut there, pared over here while spewing half-truths about how dire the budget shortfall was to push through a smaller but still haphazard budget.
The people of North Carolina would have been better served, as we have said before, with starting at ground zero and building a new budget, determining what are true needs and high-priority wants, while leaving out programs that can be done without.
Had this budget process been followed, there is no guarantee the funds for Crossroads would have been saved. But we suspect some could have been.
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