It’s being able actually to live like a human being again.
That is what Irene Kaplan said about her new life in a supported apartment after 16 years of living in one of New York City’s largest state-funded adult homes for people with mental illnesses. Now, as a result of Judge Nicholas Garaufis’ ruling last month that the state denied basic rights under the Americans With Disabilities Act to those diagnosed with mental illnesses, most of the 4,300 men and women who still live in those institutions can have the same opportunity for freedom.
The fears expressed by local civic leaders in a Daily News article last Sunday (“Ruling may force mentally ill to move from Rockaways facility”) are based on an insufficient understanding of both the nature of supported housing and the characteristics of the people who will occupy it.
As one of the experts, I testified before Garaufis in this case. My 30-years plus with the New York State Office of Mental Health — beginning as an assistant social worker, then running clinic and hospital programs that treated both adult home and supported housing residents and ultimately serving as the senior deputy commissioner — allows me to inject some clarity and experience into the discussion.
A couple of decades ago, when psychiatric hospitals were being downsized, the state needed alternatives for the people who were being discharged “into the community.”
Because New York had not developed adequate services for the people being deinstitutionalized, for-profit adult homes became an alternative to the streets.
The adult homes, many with hundreds of beds, are fully institutional — places in which the residents cannot make the most basic of decisions, such as choosing a roommate or what to eat or what time to eat.
Having a guest for dinner or overnight is out of the question; in adult homes, the needs of the institution always trump the needs of the individual.
There are more than 13,000 persons with mental illness who successfully live in supported housing in New York State. They are living in an apartment — alone or with a roommate of their choosing — to which supportive services are added. They are your neighbors, but you probably do not know it.
The assistance they get runs the gamut, from help with finding a job to help with laundry and food shopping to bringing treatment, counseling and medication into the apartment.
Supported housing allows people who are diagnosed with serious mental illnesses, people no different from those warehoused in adult homes to achieve independent lives in the community. It is only happenstance that determines who lives in supported housing and who lives in an adult home.
The Office of Mental Health created an array of outstanding programs and services for people with mental illnesses, helping many to recover and helping others gain a degree of self-sufficiency once only dreamed about. But adult homes do not do us proud. Once upon a time they were a bad solution to a state hospital problem. Now adult homes are an expensive tragedy visited upon those some people still view as less worthy.
We can and must do better.
Linda Rosenberg is the president and CEO of the National Council for Community Behavioral Healthcare. TNC specializes in lobbying for government funding toward the care and treatment of people diagnosed with amental illness. Lean more at www.thenationalcouncil.org. Article Source:http://www.articlesbase.com/mental-health-articles/ruling-gives-those-with-mental-illness-a-chance-to-live-with-dignity-1566754.html
