Valentine Message to Governor: ‘Have a Heart’ : Proposed State Health, Welfare Cuts Protested

Holding a sign that read “Closing Mental Health Clinics Is A Crazy Thing,” Gilbert Toliver said he was told that because of state budget cuts, the Hubert Humphrey Mental Health Clinic in South Central might have to close. And for the first time in seven years of treatment there, Toliver would have to find somewhere else to go.

“They said I’d never be able to function in society again,” said Toliver, who said he began receiving psychiatric treatment in 1982 and at first was given a barrage of prescription drugs that left him virtually immobilized. But since starting group therapy at the clinic, he has been able to function without the drugs. “I’m afraid if there is no more therapy, if I can’t talk to people--I might have to go back to the drugs.”

Toliver, and about 30 other mental health patients and representatives of various health services and organizations, gathered Tuesday in front of Gov. George Deukmejian’s Los Angeles office to send the governor a Valentine’s Day message, but it wasn’t one of romance. It was a plea for compassion, asking him to “have a heart” and reconsider his currently proposed budget which would cut $485 million from health and welfare services.

“We protest cuts in your budget affecting the health and welfare of women and children, the sick, the poor and the elderly,” said Dr. Sol Londe, of the Los Angeles Health Access Coalition, which organized the protest. “We face a clear and present danger in the over $100 million cut in funds to our overburdened county hospitals and clinics, which would result from your budget.”

Londe’s statement, and the printed valentine challenging the governor to reevaluate proposed fiscal cuts in home care, family planning, and medical services, was submitted to Deukmejian staffers who said they would send it to the governor in Sacramento, according to Los Angeles coalition coordinator Lynn Kersey.

Under fire is the governor’s proposed budget for 1989-90, which would include the elimination of state funding for family planning clinics throughout the state, a $64 million cut in the state’s homecare program, and the suspension of a mandated cost of living increase for recipients of state aid.

Those at the gathering also protested the governor’s proposed $1.1-billion fiscal emergency reserve, which they said could be spent on California’s health care system. They also criticized what Kersey called “the hijacking of Prop. 99 funds”--tobacco tax revenue that was primarily designated for the health care system but will now be divided among other programs.

Kevin Brett, a spokesman for the governor’s office, said upon receiving the valentine, “They say have a heart (but) it’s not that simple. This is the most difficult budget situation we have had in six years.”

Brett added that because of various voter mandates, such as Proposition 98 which calls for 40% of all revenue coming into the state to go to schools, the governor has been forced to make drastic cuts in numerous programs, to forestall even more extreme fiscal reductions in the future. In short, “California has had to rob Peter to pay Paul.”

But the money, said protestors, should not come at the expense of programs for the poor, elderly and mentally ill.