$21-Million Program to Help Mentally Ill Achieves Passage
After two years of wrangling, a $21.1-million program to help California’s mentally ill went to the governor’s desk Thursday.
The measure by Assemblyman Bruce Bronzan (D-Fresno) would establish local community programs to help the mentally disturbed--especially children and the aged--obtain income, health care, food, shelter, clothing and psychiatric help.
It won a 34-0 vote of the Senate, whose amendments were approved immediately afterward on a 75-0 Assembly vote.
The proposal includes provisions to “case-manage” the homeless by assigning each a welfare worker who would help the homeless person obtain as many benefits and services as possible.
“Over two years of work has gone into this,” said Sen. Dan McCorquodale (D-San Jose), who carried Bronzan’s measure on the Senate floor.
The bill is designed to solve problems resulting from mental health care changes during the 1950s and 1960s in which thousands of mentally ill people were released from state hospitals, but were not assisted by funds and programs in local communities.
The bill, which has bipartisan support, is the outgrowth of an Assembly study of mental health problems in California. Bronzan’s measure originally contained proposals totaling $58.3 million, but it was scaled back sharply as it moved through legislative committees.
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