200 Protest Cutbacks in Mental Services

More than 200 people demonstrated Friday in protest of plans to close or drastically reduce services at 13 mental health clinics in Los Angeles County, including four in the San Fernando Valley.

The noon rally at West San Fernando Valley Mental Health Services, an outpatient clinic in Canoga Park, came one day after a Superior Court judge temporarily barred the county from moving ahead with the cutbacks until a court hearing can be held Aug. 29.

The county Department of Mental Health, faced with $18.1 million in budget cuts, planned to close doors to six clinics by the end of the month and curtail services at seven others.

On the closure list in the Valley are the West Valley clinic, East San Fernando Valley clinic in North Hollywood and Hillview Mental Health Center in Lakeview Terrace, said Judy Cooperberg, regional director of the Mental Health Assn. of Los Angeles. Services at Olive View Medical Center in Sylmar would be reduced, she said. The reductions would affect more than 6,000 patients in the Valley and about 20,000 countywide, Cooperberg said.

The rally, organized by the Mental Health Assn. and the Los Angeles Advocates for Mental Health, was attended by patients, family members and mental health workers.

“We’re hoping to get officials to see that people from all over the community are willing to fight for their services and that people aren’t going to play hopeless anymore,” Cooperberg said. “This is an inhumane thing to do. We are in a real crisis.”

Glenn Comer, 35, of Reseda, one of six patients who filed a lawsuit against the county and state opposing the cutbacks, said the care he received at the West Valley clinic over the last four months has been critical to his well-being.

Comer said he has received treatment for manic depression and suicidal tendencies. He said he cannot afford private care if the county clinic is closed.

“Since I’ve been coming here, they’ve been able to control my symptoms,” Comer said. “It gives me someplace to go where people understand my problems. A lot of us aren’t going to make it without the clinic.”

Jim Carroll, one of the attorneys representing the six patients, said the state has the primary financial responsibility for mental health care but the county is obligated to provide the services.

Roberta Fesler, an assistant county counsel, said the county has exceeded its financial obligations to provide those services over the last several years. This year, the county paid $33 million for mental health care services, about $3 million over its legal obligation, she said. The state contributed $152 million.

“There just aren’t enough county dollars to go around,” Fesler said. “We don’t have the dollars in this year’s budget to provide services. The only alternative is to cut back services.”

Dean Owen, a spokesman for the state Department of Mental Health, said “there is not a great deal the state can do about it.”

“We’re working with counties as much as we can to give them some assistance,” Owens said. But “money is extremely tight. We don’t see any significant increase in funding coming down the road anytime soon.”

Opponents of the closures said they will hold another rally Monday at Hubert H. Humphrey Comprehensive Health Center in South-Central Los Angeles.