Redevelopment Programme
The Spastic Children’s Association of Selangor & Federal Territory (SCAS & FT) was established 50 years ago with the objectives of providing hope for children born with Celebral Palsy (CP). There are only two other Centres like ours in the whole country dedicated to provide rehabilitations for spastic children; one is in Penang and the other in Johor Bahru.
The needs of CP children are very specific. Hence, we provide a big ray of hope for CP children. We encourage parents to bring their children to us at a very young age (even a few months old) and we provide life-long education, living skills and vocational training, sports training, occupational therapy and employment in our sheltered workshops. Our children have achieved many successes especially in the arena of sports for the disabled. They have brought honour to our country in international sports competitions for the disabled at the Paralympics, World and Asian Championships.
Some of the children have gained outside employment and are able to live independently. However the majority continue to work in our Sheltered Workshops at the Centre. This enables them to qualify for the government subsidy of RM300 per month for being employed.
The cost of running our Centre is about RM 2 million a year. While we are getting approximately 20% of our expenditure from the government, we have to continuously source for income from the public and the corporate sector. We are grateful to our supporters for their continuous support over the years.
The Association is now looking ahead and has drawn up plans to redevelop its 50 year old building into a twin six-storey building, with a view to provide:-
- Additional capacity so that we can meet the needs of the future. We expect that by the year 2020, we will need to cope with at least 2-3 times more CP children.
- Dormitory facilities, one for males and the other for females, for respite care to relieve parents who may have to attend functions and other engagements.
- Additional car parking bays, as the current car park has limited capacity.
- Additional space to generate revenue to ensure continued survival of the Spastic Centre.
We intend to name the new building “Bangunan Sultan Sharafuddin Idris Shah”. After our Royal Patron, DYMM Sultan of Selangor.
The Association’s current major task is to raise sufficient funds to carry out the above Redevelopment Programme, which is estimated to cost RM12 million. Looks like we are able to raise about RM6 million and we hope with the support of the private sector and the media, we will obtain the other RM6 million as a matching donation for the redevelopment project – in the not too distant future.