Adult foster homes, neighbors uneasy

A modest split-level house in Andover is set to become home to four women in recovery from mental illness and other troubles.

City residents Jeorgette Knoll and Bob Meinert are interested observers, albeit with different perspectives on the house, one of more than 4,800 adult foster-care homes in Minnesota.

Knoll has a disabled son in adult foster care who lives an hour away because of a shortage of facilities in Anoka County, a situation she'd like to see change. Meinert, who lives near the new home, says a different shortage -- of information from county officials and home operators -- has done little to quell his fears of the potential for a nuisance house.

The number of adult foster homes -- a continuously supervised step between the hospital and independent living -- has grown in recent years. It's usually happened out of public view, although the Andover debate and an episode in Centerville provided examples of how the legal rights of patients to live where they choose sometimes clashes with neighbors' concerns.

Like other states, Minnesota is working to comply with a 1999 U.S. Supreme Court order to move people with disabilities from institutional to community care when appropriate. This year, Anoka County has had 22 new adult-foster homes either licensed by the state or moving through the process. Statewide, the number of such foster homes increased by 188, to 4,825, between July 2008 and July 2009. Since then, a budget-driven moratorium has been in place on this more expensive care.

Fair Housing requirements

The federal Fair Housing Act requires cities to treat people with disabilities the same as anyone else, just as it bars housing bias based on race, religion, gender or family status. Licensed adult foster homes with four or fewer residents can set up where the operators want, without community notification.

In Andover, about 50 people attended a community meeting last month, almost all in opposition to the home; some have hired an attorney. Several mentioned the Zumbro House, a foster program for developmentally disabled boys that was to go in Centerville before neighborhood opposition -- and a brick through the window -- led the operator to look elsewhere in the county.

Last week, at a meeting in Spring Lake Park, residents spoke for and against a home proposed there.

Most of the time, operators of adult foster-care homes quietly notify cities after they open and the homes go unnoticed beyond immediate neighbors, said Bill Pinsonnault, Anoka County's director of Community Social Services and Mental Health. "Our experience is within a few months, when nothing has happened, and none of their fears have proven to be true, it settles down very quickly," he said.

Efforts to change state law to allow cities more leeway in locating adult foster homes have not gone far. Brooklyn Park is among a few cities that classify such facilities as rental property, involving a fee and yearly inspections. The measure also allows the city to alert potential providers to clustering in one area and, in such cases, recommend that they look elsewhere in the city. Some do.

Demand exceeds supply

Knoll's son Joe is one. She said she's pained to hear the fears some have of people like Joe, who has autism and schizophrenia. "It took my husband and myself by surprise to think there is still that kind of stigma about people who are mentally ill," said Knoll, who also has another son in adult foster care closer to her home.

Meinert said Joe Knoll would be welcome in his neighborhood. At least neighbors know he has a support network, a loving family, Meinert said. But he said that the generalities about incoming residents that officials and the operator were legally able to provide -- medical data is protected -- were insufficient.

"I believe they intentionally batched together a myriad of conditions and basically tried to paint us ... as bigots," he said. "We're not. We just want to understand what's coming into the neighborhood."

At the Andover meeting, Stacy Ingraham described her experience living across from a South Metro facility serving four men in Shoreview.

The home went in about seven years ago. Ingraham said she initially had good rapport with the staff, but turnover and negative experiences led her to distrust South Metro. In recent years, she said, residents have charged her van, urinated on the bike path as her daughter rode by, stood on her property and photographed her house.

South Metro Director Terry Schneider disputed some of her claims, saying some might be misunderstandings and many could be addressed with better communication.

Although the state licenses adult foster care facilities, no single agency tracks all neighbor complaints.

Another experience

In 2002, Scandia, to the northeast, unsuccessfully opposed an adult foster care facility put in near a school and sports field. City Council Member Dolores Peterson was one of the opponents. The home is back up to her six-acre property, and her son lives next door to it.

"You know the people in the neighborhood now; they've said they couldn't be better neighbors," Peterson said. She believes that putting the operator on notice that the city was paying attention raised expectations and results.