Wed public hearing on bill to make physical restraint of students easier

[Maine Disability Alerts]

Dear Friends of Maine Students with Disabilties,

Public hearing is this Wed afternoon, starting at 1 pm, on LD 1248, "An 

Act Regarding Physical Escort and Restraint and Seclusion of Students in Schools".

The bill would make it easier to physically restrain students (which almost always means students with disabilities) in two ways:

• It would redefine "physical escort" (which, under Maine law, is voluntary and therefore not restraint) so that it wouldn't have to be voluntary. In order words, if a student were physically and involuntarily moved to a safe location, it would no longer be considered a restraint.
• It would allow restraint if there was any risk of injury (even nonserious injury, even if psychological injury).

The public hearing is happening during school vacation week. This makes it easy for school personnel to testify But it makes it difficult for parent to testify, especially in person.

Same thing happened in 2013, when Maine Education Association and school administrators support a bill to repeal restrictions on restraint and seclusion--the hearing was scheduled during school vacation week, making it easy for school staff to attend and making it difficult for parents to attend.

However, in 2025, you testify online in writing, and you can testify online via zoom.

To testify:

• Go to https://www.mainelegislature.org/testimony/
• Click the "Public Hearing" radio button
• Choose "Education and Cultural Affairs" from the "Choose a committee" pull-down menu
• Choose "Apr 23 2025 1:00 PM" from the "Choose date" pull-down menu
• Click the radio button for "LD 1248 - An Act Regarding Physical Escort and Restraint and Seclusion of Students in Schools"

You can upload written testimony or type it into the text box. If you want to testify via zoom then be sure to check the "I would like to testify electronically over Zoom" checkbox, in which case the legislature will email you a link to use to testify.

After you've filled everything out, check "I'm not a robot" and click "Submit/Register"

BTW, you may also be interested in testifying on the following bills as well:

• LD 1097 An Act to Provide De-escalation and Behavior Intervention Training for School Personnel
• LD 1398 An Act Regarding Behavioral Health Support for Students in Public Schools

All three of these bills (as well as 2 others) are scheduled for public hearing Wed afternoon. You can testify on as many bills as you like, but if you testify online (written and/or zoom) then you have to fill out the form for each bill separately.

thank you!