COHASSET, Minn. _ The morning sky was still dark when a bus carrying two dozen adults with disabilities pulled up before a small factory on Minnesota's Iron Range. Many of the passengers looked half asleep as they stumbled into the hazy drizzle clutching lunch sacks and mini-coolers.
But that did not prevent John Week, a container of coffee steaming in his hand, from darting from one person to the next, pumping fists and shouting words of support. "Hey grumpy bear! How ya doin'?" he said, embracing a man in a wheelchair. Moments later, the workers were wide-awake and laughing as Week led them through a round of stretching exercises. "Let's roll!" he yelled, as workers rushed to the factory floor.
The workers' buoyant mood on this fall morning underscored how a small recycling plant in this small city is pointing the way toward a new era of opportunity and inclusion for Minnesotans with disabilities. In stark contrast to the grim realities faced by thousands of other workers with disabilities across the state, employees here earn enough money to buy cars, go on cruises, save for retirement and support their families without government support.
And unlike thousands of other disabled Minnesotans, who go to work each day in cloistered settings known as "sheltered workshops," all the workers here are guaranteed at least a minimum wage, performance bonuses and opportunities for advancement.
The recycling plant, which opened in July and employs nearly 80 people, is an oasis of opportunity in a state that is still plagued by chronically high rates of unemployment and poverty among people with disabilities. Only 36 percent of working-age Minnesotans with a cognitive disability were employed as of 2013 _ less than half the rate of their non-disabled peers; and a mere 13 percent worked in the community alongside people without disabilities, among the lowest rates in the nation.
While other states have moved aggressively to integrate these workers into the general workforce, Minnesota continues to subsidize workshops where pay for "piece-rate" work often amounts to less than $1 an hour, a 2015 Star Tribune investigation found.
Under pressure from the federal courts, Minnesota has stepped up efforts to address this wide workplace gulf. In August, vocational counselors began fanning out across the state to evaluate whether thousands of people in state-subsidized workshops could instead be working in the community at a competitive wage. The administration of Gov. Mark Dayton has pledged to move nearly 20,000 Minnesotans with disabilities receiving state services into competitive, integrated employment.
Yet Minnesota's integration efforts are still in the early stages, and disability advocates fear they will falter without more support from large employers. Even in state government, the percentage of workers with disabilities has dropped from 10 percent in 1999 to just 5.9 percent in the last fiscal year, state records show.
"There is a growing recognition that we have to give people with disabilities a pathway to real work, and not simply place them in artificial communities and forget about them," said Alison Barkoff, a disability rights advocate in Washington, D.C.
The Cohasset plant, operated by Minnesota Diversified Industries, and others like it on the Iron Range could offer a new model of inclusion. The plant mixes individuals with a broad spectrum of disabilities and productivity levels with more able workers, in an environment where everyone is expected to perform at a high level. MDI officials say the model elevates people who might otherwise be isolated in sheltered workshops while still providing them with workplace supports.
Some disability advocates fault the approach because it falls short of full integration. Yet it may offer an interim step for thousands of workers who live in communities where job opportunities for people with disabilities are scarce, MDI officials maintain.
"In a perfect world, everyone with a disability would be working in the community," said Peter McDermott, president and chief executive of MDI. "But in the real world, that's not going to happen right away. We need to migrate people into a real-world setting and show people that they are able to do the work."
