By Debra Jasper
Enquirer Columbus Bureau

COLUMBUS - Twenty Ohio legislators have asked the state auditor to enact reforms in the state's mental retardation system.

In a letter to State Auditor Jim Petro, legislators said a growing demand for services has pushed county agencies to rely on private companies to care for the mentally retarded. They asked Mr. Petro to start auditing those companies and also to examine the effectiveness of the entire mental retardation system.

The lawmakers cited an investigational series by The Cincinnati Enquirer earlier this year, which documented inadequate oversight and abuses in the system that cares for the mentally retarded.

"It is essential that we find out where our money is going and that we improve accountability," said Jeff Jacobson, R-Butler Township, the state senator who wrote the letter.

Mr. Jacobson noted that three years ago he and other lawmakers sent a similar letter asking the state to audit private foster care agencies. Mr. Petro complied and has since issued findings against 15 foster care agencies for misspending a combined $9.4 million in tax dollars.

The money, meant for foster children, instead went for everything from a Mercedes-Benz roadster to plastic surgery, jet fuel, tanning bed visits and horses.

"When the state looked at spending on foster care we found a number of disturbing things," Mr. Jacobson said. "I think that's just the tip of the iceberg. If anything, looking at private companies that care for the mentally retarded is more serious because people are on their own so much. If government-sponsored services aren't working, they have no help at all."

Mr. Petro, who will be sworn in as Ohio's next attorney general in January, has agreed that performance audits of private companies that care for the mentally retarded are needed. He said such organizations should be held accountable and the mental retardation system should be overhauled.

As attorney general, Mr. Petro said he will work to create uniform state contracts that counties can use when contracting with private companies. The contracts will include, among other things, a clause that requires troubled private companies to agree to be audited by the state.

Joe Case, spokesman for Attorney General Betty Montgomery - who in an office-swapping move was just elected state auditor - said when she moves to the auditor's office in January she will examine the request.

"She's always concerned when there are questions of whether public dollars are being utilized properly," Mr. Case said.

Ms. Montgomery, Mr. Petro and lawmakers said they focused on the problems after the Enquirer's three-part series.

The series found that 77 of Ohio's 88 county mental retardation boards failed to make sure companies they hired to care for people actually took them to the doctor or gave them medicine. Fifty-three counties failed to report or investigate abuse, neglect or other serious incidents in private homes as required by law.

The newspaper found that conditions were so bad in private nursing homes and institutions that in the last three years the state threatened to cut off funding to 65 of them. It never carried out one threat.

A bill is pending in the Legislature that would allow the state to crack down on such homes through fines or other measures.

E-mail djasper@enquirer.com