Forced to carve more than $300,000 from its budget, Cottonwood Inc. on Thursday announced plans to give up one of its homes, cut staff hours, reduce and postpone pay raises and scrimp on overhead.

“These things don’t add up to $300,000, but they’re what we feel like we can handle for now,” said Sharon Spratt, executive director at Cottonwood, a Lawrence program that helps people with developmental disabilities live and work in the community. “In the meantime, we’re hoping for relief.”

Cottonwood, 2801 W. 31st St., employs about 230 people; 12 are program directors or administrators. It serves about 200 adults with developmental disabilities.

The $300,000 is Cottonwood’s share of the $49 million in spending cuts announced Dec. 4 by the Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services.

Gov. Bill Graves ordered the cuts last month to help close a $312 million gap in this year’s budget, which ends June 30. Cottonwood also has been told to expect $27,000 less from Douglas County this year.

“We’re doing everything we can to avoid layoffs,” Spratt said.

Spratt said Cottonwood also would:

⢠Give up its lease on a home in the 1700 block of Learnard Avenue. The two developmentally disabled men living there will fill openings in another home.

⢠Cut staff hours by about 15 percent. Instead of two people staffing a six-bed group day and night, there will be times when only one worker is on duty.

⢠Impose new limits on staff travel, office supply purchases and advertising.

⢠Limit pay increases for direct-care staff to 2 percent. Program directors and administrators will not get raises.

Other SRS cuts, Spratt said, will affect other services tapped by the developmentally disabled as well as Cottonwood workers.

“I’m afraid a lot of our people are going to get hit with a double or triple whammy,” Spratt said.

Also, cuts in the state’s Medicaid waiver program are expected to force Cottonwood to begin billing its developmentally disabled customers — almost all of whom are low-income — for the services they receive.

Though ordered by Graves, the cuts can be modified or rescinded during the 2003 legislative session, which convenes Jan. 13.

“I’d like to see them do something to maintain the funding for the people who cannot speak for themselves and who can’t make their own way without someone helping them,” said Peg Wiese, whose 23-year-old son, Matthew, spends his mornings at Cottonwood and his afternoons busing tables at Mr. Gatti’s Pizza, 3514 Clinton Parkway.

“My son has to have somebody with him 24-7,” Wiese said.

When Matthew isn’t at Cottonwood or Mr. Gatti’s, he’s with a Cottonwood worker, either at his home or in the community.

“If they cut that service, I’d have to quit my job,” Wiese said. “This doesn’t just affect Matthew, it affects our whole family, and I have to say this is getting pretty scary.”