PEF will fight psych center closures
By ROGER E. BENSON
The proposed Executive Budget calls for the closure of
two of the state’s premier psychiatric centers
— Middletown and Hutchings — as well as the
relocation of four children’s psychiatric centers
(Queens, Western New York, Rockland and Sagamore), and
consolidation of the Kirby Forensic Psychiatric Center
with Manhattan Psychiatric Center.
But these proposed closures and consolidations would
severely impair our members’ ability to provide
quality mental-health care, and deprive the state’s
most vulnerable citizens of treatment options and
psychiatric services close to home.
It would also create hardships for the families of the
mentally ill, because of the extra traveling they would
face to reach the distant facilities.
This year’s Executive Budget clearly represents a
bargain-basement approach to the care of the mentally
ill, where quality of care takes a distant back seat to
the goal of cutting spending.
The state has lost sight of the therapeutic benefits the
proper environment can provide.
It’s choosing to eliminate treatment options and is
moving to a one-size-fits-all approach to services for
the state’s mentally ill. In short, the state Office
of Mental Health is pursuing cost cutting over the
well-being of the state’s citizens.
PEF is saying “No” to the governor’s
proposal to close and consolidate the psychiatric
centers, and is aggressively pursuing help from the state
Legislature to fight the cutbacks.
We are asking state lawmakers to keep all current
mental-health-treatment options available, and to
increase direct-care staffing levels in all the
state’s psychiatric centers. PEF will fight the
proposals in the Executive Budget using all means at our
disposal.
We have prepared a plan that utilizes PEF’s greatest
strength: its membership. We will combine our
mobilization effort with a public-relations and
legislative campaign to fight this proposal and expose it
as an attack on the state’s mentally ill and their
families.
We cannot and will not let the Office of Mental Health
cut the state’s safety net for the mentally ill.