Organizational Differences 1.While generating information for a variety of purposes is commendable, it's important that all regional centers and area boards adopt the same primary purpose for completing the life quality assessment process as recently written into law . This new legislation will likely produce a difficult transition for many regional centers who have used the LQA process to largely monitor regional center performance, to assess aggregate satisfaction, or to learn about services at certain facilities or programs. All regional centers and area boards should develop interagency working agreements which outline the process and indicate how the purposes of the LQA will be met . We foresee a variety of problems in mixing quality enhancement efforts with traditional enforcement and monitoring activities. If the LQA process is used primarily to protect rights, it may not produce information that will facilitate service quality for individuals and their families.
Fear can lead to manipulation, masking information, and the like.
3.We would recommend that each regional center think about and formalize any purposes for the process beyond those recently written into law . These purposes may include assessing regional center or service provider performance, increasing community connections and personal advocacy, learning to listen better, and measuring personal satisfaction. It appears to us that without such a person, life quality assessments can easily lose credibility, and end up not making much difference in people's lives. We would recommend the development of a local coordinating council . They also may serve an important role in the transition of the work from regional centers to area boards.