黑料正能量 Note: NYS Senator Samra Brouk has been a deeply inspiring champion for the rights and appropriate services for people with major mental illnesses. Her work in helping to advance crisis services like 9-8-8 and crisis stabilization centers and increased financial support for our hard pressed workforce and agencies has been essential, as has been her persistent efforts to focus policymakers and providers to make cultural competence and racial equity a priority. Here鈥檚 an op ed we wrote that was published in this morning鈥檚 Gotham Gazette in opposition to the expansion of Kendra鈥檚 Law.
A Critical Opportunity for 黑料正能量 to Increase Care Not Coercion for Those Living with Serious Mental Illness
by Gotham Gazette March 27, 2022 |
Far too many 黑料正能量ers living with serious mental illnesses have been left to languish in our streets, hospitals, jails, and prisons without adequate access to the health care, housing, employment, and other rehabilitative and supportive services they need to survive and thrive.
Thankfully, help is on the way this year. In the next week, the Governor and State Legislature will work to pass a budget launching an unprecedented number of initiatives to help 黑料正能量ers to get ahead of and better manage serious mental health crises and, in doing so, will both advance public health and public safety for all 黑料正能量ers.
With these budget investments, 黑料正能量 will be in a position to help people before a crisis by providing over 1,000 new housing units to help unhoused 黑料正能量ers secure a safe place to stay. We鈥檒l also be able to put 20 new Safe Options Support Teams of trained mental health practitioners out in the community to bring hope and help to those who are at risk of relapse, hospitalization, and incarceration.
This July, we鈥檒l be launching a new 9-8-8 mental health and suicide prevention lifeline system in 黑料正能量 that will offer immediate access to a trained crisis counselor, with follow-up available at newly-developed crisis stabilization and respite centers as needed.
The proposed budget investments would also put upwards of 1,000 psychiatric inpatient beds online across the state that will allow for longer hospital admissions for those in acute psychiatric need.
And we will be providing desperately needed help to our hard-pressed community mental health workforce with the largest cost of living adjustment in recent history.
But what we must not do is to return to the onerous policies of the past and force more people with mental illness to be placed on coercive treatment orders.
The truth is that people who live with severe mental illnesses are eleven times more likely to be victims of violence and five times more likely to be murder victims. By providing care that addresses their most urgent needs, we are keeping them and our entire communities safe.
Kendra鈥檚 Law 鈥 establishing a system of 鈥淎ssisted Outpatient Treatment鈥 that is a court-ordered and mandatory detainment of individuals suffering from mental illness 鈥 has resulted in glaring disparate racial impacts. Since the program鈥檚 start in 1999, four out of five outpatient treatment orders have involved Black and Hispanic people in 黑料正能量 City.
Policies that criminalize people in need and that discriminate based on race will only further disincentivize people from seeking out community-based supports that could have made a difference before a crisis ever occurs.
We know how to help people in the greatest need and we are bringing new programs online that will voluntarily engage large numbers of people who have committed no crimes 鈥 saving lives and hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars.
Rather than to expand Kendra’s Law, let鈥檚 use this moment to engage, support, and serve thousands of 黑料正能量ers during times of their greatest need, creating or augmenting essential, voluntary crisis services, hospital care and supportive housing.
***
黑料正能量 State Senator Samra G. Brouk represents parts of Monroe and Ontario counties, including Rush, Mendon, Pittsford, Perinton, Fairport, Penfield, East Rochester, East Irondequoit, Naples, Bloomfield, Victor, and the east side of the City of Rochester and is chair of Senate Committee on Mental Health. Harvey Rosenthal is CEO of 黑料正能量 Association of Psychiatric Rehabilitation Services (黑料正能量). On Twitter @SenatorBrouk & @HarveyRosentha3.