‘Shortchanging Mental Health’ in L.A. County

Your editorial (June 28) “Shortchanging Mental Health,” was inaccurate relative to the budget plan for the mental health augmentation money.

The $2 million mentioned as designated for MacLaren Children’s Center is consistent with the recent Grand Jury’s recommendations. The funds would actually be used to develop alternatives to MacLaren for children with acute mental illness and to develop a diagnostic unit to identify the children in need of mental health care. They would then be referred as quickly as possible to an appropriate treatment setting.

Further, the plan does not call for the creation of 152 new mental-health-crisis beds at county hospitals as you reported. Nor does it call for 80 additional beds at Olive View.

A total of $6.9 million is the plan for community programs, which range from residential care to outpatient programs. It is considerably more than the $100,000 you cited in your editorial.

The $500,000 proposed for a homeless shelter in the San Fernando Valley would fund a residential treatment program for the homeless mentally ill. It has been estimated that 50% of the homeless in our county suffer from some degree of mental illness, and using mental health funds to help treat that part of the homeless population is an appropriate use of mental health funds. In addition, you failed to mention the plan proposes to fund shelters for the homeless mentally ill in the Santa Monica area and the San Pedro area.

The Department of Mental Health’s augmentation plan was prepared with a countywide focus and is responsive to needs which are prevalent throughout the county.

The priority for the department remains the need to serve the severely and chronically disabled mentally ill, with the highest priority being a need to strengthen children and youth services. In February, when the planning began for use of the augmentation funds, high priority program service needs and populations were identified. These included 24-hour acute inpatient and crisis residential care, services to the mentally ill among the homeless, those caught up in the justice system, ethnic minorities, substance abusers and the elderly.

The department’s augmentation plan addresses all of these priority needs.

MICHAEL D. ANTONOVICH

Supervisor

Fifth District

Los Angeles

Your editorial was right on target and clearly pointed out how once again the mentally ill are being shuffled aside as current political issues take precedence over their welfare.

We who have mentally ill relatives are shocked and dismayed at the imbalance in allocation of the $11-million augmentation funding in the plan submitted by the Mental Health Department to the Board of Supervisors. It definitely shortchanges the quality of life for the mentally ill by not providing them with an alternative to hospital care.

Urgently needed community programs would enable them to be more productive members in our society and would drastically reduce hospitalization. I know for a fact that community-based outpatient programs of medication and socialization encourages them to move forward in the real world. Only about $100,000 of the $11 million will be put into those programs in the department’s plan!

The mentally ill deserve the type of supportive care that helps them achieve some measure of worth and dignity.

BEVERLY SAMPLES

South Pasadena