Bearing the brunt of social policies

Re “Written off,” Current, April 1

Chip Ward’s article shows us the limits of the so-called pharmaceutical revolution that deinstitutionalized hundreds of thousands of the mentally ill in the 20th century. This “revolution” increased homelessness, created hundreds of privately operated residential and day programs with less than consistent consumer/client care (coupled with budget-constrained state oversight) and is in part responsible for the warehouse function thrust upon the public libraries.

Medication works, but it doesn’t work unless you take it. For Ward and any professional staff or patron of a public library, the solution is to demand proper and humanitarian institutional and community care for the mentally ill who are not medication compliant.

DAVID A. REGO

Boston

*

I’m a librarian, and this is what I’ve been telling library patrons for years when they complain about homeless people being in the library: Public libraries, city police, city paramedics and social services are the rug under which then-Gov. Ronald Reagan swept these people when he trashed the social contract by closing societal mental care facilities. You want a cleaner, nicer, more considerate place to come to in your city? Change your government into a cleaner, nicer, more considerate one that honors and respects you by honoring everyone’s social contract with universal health and mental care. Then your city might have enough money left over to provide you better parks, libraries and schools.

BILL TRZECIAK

Burbank