By Debra Jasper and Spencer Hunt
Photos by Michael E. Keating
The Cincinnati Enquirer

At the center of problems at all levels is inadequate staffing and training.

The government requires everyone who provides care to the mentally retarded to learn CPR, fire safety and other critical skills.

But some facilities are so desperate for help they throw new workers into jobs with little or no preparation. When workers are caught without training, the state cites the facilities, employees are trained and operations go on.

In some places, workers are spread so thin they don't have time to bathe people, change their diapers or watch over residents with serious eating disorders. Often, there aren't enough employees to keep aggressive residents from striking, biting or sexually abusing others.

A mentally retarded man at Buckeye Community Service's Hartman Road nursing home in Athens County swallowed inedible objects 34 times in 1998, including a double-A battery and four fishhook sinkers. The man now is under 24-hour, one-on-one supervision.

In Columbus, a mentally retarded, convicted sex offender repeatedly went behind his group home without supervision and stared at children on a school playground, an inspection of the Association of Developmental Disabilities home on Lane Avenue shows.

The man was indicted in 1998 for molesting a minor away from the home and admitted to the crime. The state cited the home for failing to monitor the man, and the home discharged him to a facility for sex offenders.

Robert Archer, head of the association, won't comment on this case. But he says it's difficult to refuse to care for offenders because county officials might stop referring people to his home.

Mr. Ritchey say there are so few places to put mentally retarded sex offenders and other criminals that "judges will put people where there is a vacancy, and they may not belong there."

"This system," he says, "needs work."

High worker turnover >