From WFTV in Orlando:
Jennifer Groover has received Social Security since she was 6 years old because she has Down Syndrome.
But 38 years later, the Social Security Administration has taken away those benefits, her only income, because they said they had no evidence or documentation right now saying she has the disability.
“We’ve got one letter that she needs to go to work,” Cynthia Groover, her mom, said. “Yeah, they said we’ll help her get a job. She can go to work. She can barely walk. Her legs and feet are so bad. She’s so full of arthritis, and there’s no way she could walk. No, she can’t. She doesn’t have the mentality to hold the job.”
In July of 2023, the family received a letter giving them 10 days to respond.
If not, the SSA said it may have to make a “finding of not disabled because of insufficient evidence.”
Notes from the Groovers said they could not get anyone to answer after they left 16 messages. ...
But on July 15, 2023, her benefits stopped after they decided “she was no longer disabled.” ...
In that year, they were evicted from their home and have struggled every month to pay their bills. ...
There has been some movement in her case.
The Groovers tell Channel 9 that Social Security wants them to get a blood test to determine if Jennifer has that extra chromosome, which has not happened yet. ...
In case you don't know the law, the Groovers don't have to produce any evidence whatsoever for their daughter to stay on benefits. The burden is squarely on Social Security to produce evidence that this young woman has improved. The agency's inability to find its old file isn't reason to cut her off benefits.
You would think that anyone would realize that Down Syndrome won't go away or get better with time but you never know just how foolish these things can get. I've had a client with retinitis pigmentosa denied because there was no recent evidence that she was blind. The old evidence wasn't enough. If you know anything about retinitis pigmentosa, you know it's a one way trip. Once your vision is gone, it's gone for good and there's no more point in going to an eye doctor.
8 comments:
This article is unclear on several points, but the cessation should not have occurred unless there was fraud or similar fault. If reconsideration or preheating is pending, it should be reversed and payments restored.
Every day this agency stops the benefits of at least thousands of people who did not respond to a notice or request, which is allowed in POMS DI 28075.005 even when the individual has no address due to homelessness, even if that impairment is unquestionably not considered one that improves, and POMS DI 28040.10, DI 26525.045, DI 13005.22 provide helpful lists of impairments.
CP is on the MINE list, applicable to "all adults and children, except those less than 1 year of age." This is likely her 6th or 7th CDR, and they allude to wanting to karyotype her, so DDS is looking for Down syndrome or another CAL impairment? I suspect there is an argument that the listings in 1.00 and 12.00 are stricter now and if she doesn't use a power-chair with both hands and has an IQ above 65, she can definitely be a dowel inspector at Step 5, see how that works?
Despite a chunk of POMS devoted to reiterating things like IQs and blindness are forever or get worse, every CDR season they make these DISABLED people jump through hoops to give the same unchanging information their own regs tell them is unnecessary. As long as they continue to live and there is no reported income, these CDRs are a waste of taxpayer funds. And they absolutely litigate it for decades through federal court and make the same exact stupid arguments that fail to acknowledge their own regs, so the stupidity and waste just continues forever while these people lose all their resources.
Merica.
This is reminiscent of the early 1980s, and the policies that led to the Disability Benefits Reform Act of 1984.
If we don’t have the prior file and can’t reconstruct it we have to continue benefits. My guess in this case is benefits ended for some other reason and then not automatically reinstated.
@11:07am
Actually, in my experience (30 years), there are large numbers of severely disabled MINE individuals out there approved in the 1980's and earlier who have been receiving benefits for much of their lives who have never actually had a medical CDR. Often, their approvals never got entered into the DCF that controls CDRs. They were assigned a MINE diary at initial approval, then were never looked at again. The ones that were caught were then screened out of the CDR workloads over and over and over again. The folders , especially CDB claimants, often get destroyed in error (i.e. the NRC attaches them to the wage earner's folder in storage, and then just destroys the entire folder bundle with the wage earner's file a few years after the wage earner attains FRA or dies, without ever even checking to see if there are folders attached associated with other claimants that shouldn't be destroyed. It is exacerbated by the fact that NRC workers assign the wage earner's same folder barcode to the CDB folders, even going so far as to totally mark CDB folder barcodes out or to overlay them with the wage earner's barcode).
Then, those CDBs finally get selected for an actual medical CDR and the folder has to be reconstructed. I saw several of them for Downs' cases last year alone before I retired, so DDS is definitely looking at something else on them. And, I do recall they did karyotype testing on every single one of them I saw. They did cease one, but it was quickly reversed by DHU without a hearing.
@11:18am,
Except, that in these times, a repeat of the 1984 reform act has less than a snowball's chance in hell of passing the Congressional Houses of Idiots and Morons or to be signed by one of the two candidates for President.
This seems to substantiate my suspicion that examiners and their supervisors with little understanding of social security disability regulations are sometimes making decisions. It has been established that one does not improve or change from mental retardation. Unless the person found a good paying job, this shouldn't have happened.
When the person gets that notice allowing 10 days to keep benefits pending appeal, they need to go into the office and make sure SSA has that signed notice.
Please please please folks, when things aren't going right, get some help! I wish they could sue their DDS for the losses they suffered because of this wrongful termination.
@4:00pm,
There are some training issues at the DDSes, without a doubt, mainly due to the huge workforce turnover that they suffer yearly.
However, it more has to do with the fact that certain individuals within the upper levels of the agency have for ages been slowly pushing and prodding the conservative political agendas of their political patrons into reality by revising the regulations and listings of impairments. Social Security can't be politically touched, so they have their inside minions do what they can to make an absolute chaotic, mean-spirited mess of the system. They live for cutting people off, because they don't believe anybody should ever have been approved in the first place. Nothing is done about it because the disabled are essentially voiceless, and the general public has no interest in doing anything for those they see as frauds and cheats.
Unfortunately, the DDSes are caught in the middle. Even the examiners that know what they are doing are required to follow established agency policies whether they personally agree with them or not. If they don't, the regional DQBs just write them up and dump the cases back on them.
It is what it is.
Unfortunately, the DDSes are caught in the middle. Even the examiners that know what they are doing are required to follow established agency policies whether they personally agree with them or not. If they don't, the regional DQBs just write them up and dump the cases back on them.
This. We can continue MINE CDRs with little evidence, but if a folder has been destroyed, we usually will have to end up getting a CE due to regular providers not doing detailed exams for chronic impairments. When I hear "I've had a client with retinitis pigmentosa denied because there was no recent evidence that she was blind. The old evidence wasn't enough." ..While it doesn't get better, DDS can't just continue based on old evidence. Argue with SSA or congress, but don't blame the DDS for doing what they have to with the POMS they are given. We're just trying to do our jobs to the best of our ability.
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