Hope Homes is going it alone, with or without Government help, the cash-strapped charity for the mentally handicapped has announced.

The home's Board of Directors made a desperate appeal for public assistance yesterday, inviting all interested parties to visit the Brunswick Street location. Those who wish to do so can call Hope Homes on 292-7206.

Board chairman Alan Robinson accused Government of being disingenuous and of withholding money from the home in the past, forcing Hope Homes to use money that was earmarked for building maintenance to help provide accommodation for their clients. "The Ministry owes Hope Homes over $90,000 in room and board fees. The current fiscal dilemma being faced by Hope Homes can be correlated with the Ministry's payments," he said, adding later: "The maintenance of the physical plant has been adversely affected by the under-funding referred to above."

Overcrowding at the home was the fault of Government, he said. Hope Homes began in 1983 with eight residents, according to founder Ellen Douglas's credo of housing "no more than could be fit around a dinner table". However, not long after, Hope Homes took on seven more clients while "under extreme duress" from Government. At one point the number of residents at the facility was 25 ? thanks to urgent placement requests by Ministry of Health and Family Services, the Board said.

And the Board claimed fund-raising group Project 100 has no desire to be associated with Hope Homes, saying donations are made to Project 100 for Hope Homes which are never seen by the facility. "So serious is the rift that Project 100 has persuaded the (Health) Minister that Hope Homes should be 'wound up'," Mr. Robinson said.

"In summary the Association for the Mentally Handicapped of Bermuda and the Board of Directors of Hope Homes regrets that the Minister of Health and Family Services has allowed herself to be ill-advised by Project 100 to adopt a most retrogressive public policy that would do irreparable damage to a small group of mentally handicapped persons by returning them to the control of St. Brendan's Hospital," he continued.

"The Association for the Mentally Handicapped intends to do all within its power to resist the decision of the Minister and to invite interested persons in Bermuda to support the Association in achieving its goal of providing quality care for the mentally handicapped in the least restrictive environment ... Hope Homes can not and will not abandon its mission to serve the mentally handicapped of Bermuda."

In a letter sent to Health Minister Patrice Minors and received on August 30, the Board rejected proposals from Project 100 to wind up Hope Homes and transfer land in the Hope Homes Trust to the Project 100 Property Trust, appointing representatives from Hope Homes to the Project 100 Trust.

The Project 100 Trust was then to determine the feasibility of repairing Hope Homes' Brunswick Street facility, or consider the option of selling it to buy two more homes with no more than six clients per home. St. Brendan's would become the caregivers responsible.

"It is with regret that the Board is unable to accept the Project 100 proposals and instead proffers its own proposals," Mr. Robinson wrote in the letter.

Those proposals included maintaining the family unit at the Brunswick Street facility; continued improvement of financial reporting processes; assisting each resident with gaining Financial Assistance; to clarify the difference between Project 100 and Hope Homes; and to defy St. Brendan's to set national standards for residential care.

The charity has already been using retirement money donated by Mrs. Douglas and her husband to keep the home running. "We'll do what we have to do," special projects officer Ben Nunn told the press conference. "There's no one wanting to face the responsibility of caring for these clients ... If they're sedated, what's a TV and a checkerboard going to do?"