‘We have to help these people’
More mental health funding is needed, parents tell lawmakers
At first, Ted Streuli wasn’t sure what was happening to his son.
Early on, Colby was a typical teenager. He loved hockey, video games and skateboards. But as Colby aged, he began to act more and more strangely.
One day, Streuli picked a psychiatrist at random out of the phone book and made Colby an appointment.
Soon, they had a diagnosis: schizophrenia with paranoia, a serious and lifelong brain disease. Streuli asked the doctor about Colby’s prognosis.
“Well, there are no happy endings,” the psychiatrist told the anxious father. “Most of them either end up dead or in prison.”
Streuli and his wife spent the next 10 years, expecting that phone call. When Colby was 28, he died after jumping into a creek late one night.
Streuli, editor of The Journal Record, stood alongside The Oklahoman Editor Kelly Dyer Fry on Wednesday at a forum, targeted at lawmakers to stress the importance of funding mental health and substance abuse services, even as the state faces a major budget shortfall in the coming fiscal year.
Both parents shared their stories of struggle to find the best quality mental health and substance abuse care for their adult children.
“Some issues have to rise above daily business competitions, they have to rise above partisanship, they have to rise above politics, they have to rise above the next campaign,” Streuli said.
“They are too important to us as human beings, they’re too important to us as a state, to let them get bogged down in our dayto-day stuff,” he said.
The Oklahoma Substance Abuse Services Alliance hosted the event, which was largely focused on lawmakers’ roles in funding mental health and substance abuse services.
State spending
Oklahoma spends $56.22 per capita on mental health, less than half the national average of $129.27, according to federal data. Only Kentucky, Idaho, Florida, Arkansas, Texas and Georgia spend less on mental health than Oklahoma.
Meanwhile, the state has the second highest rate of adults with serious mental illness, according to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
Commissioner Terri White, of the Oklahoma Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services, said at Wednesday’s forum that residents with mental illnesses and substance use disorders can recover — but only if they can get the treatment they need.
And the majority of Oklahomans who need treatment don’t get it. For example, an estimated six out of 10 adults who need treatment do not receive it, a 2014 Mental Health America report showed.
“When we choose not to invest in these diseases, when we choose not to ensure that more people can get in that narrow door, what happens is, we see a huge cost, more than it would ever cost to provide treatment in the first place,” White said.
Fry, vice president for news at The Oklahoman Media Company, said Oklahoma must make a long-term investment in its mental health system to help ensure people get the care they need.
Fry’s son Eric, 30, is in recovery after years of struggling with heroin addiction.
Eric was in and out of treatment for years, and at one point, about eight years ago, was shot while trying to buy drugs. He survived, but the bullet remains lodged near his spine, too dangerous to remove.
“He is good today, and I’m excited about that — but I know that this is a chronic disease, and I know it takes every person in this room to work together to fight it, and it is not a time to cut,” Fry said.
“I’m so aware of our funding crisis, but it’s not a time to cut these services for the Oklahomans who so desperately are in need. We can’t just keep filling up our prisons. We have to help these people,” she said.
Fry said over the past five years, she has told her family’s story publicly several times, and at least one audience member always approaches her afterward.
Countless Oklahoma families quietly struggle with addiction and mental illness every day, Fry said.
“There’s 1,000 mothers standing behind me, asking for your help,” Fry said. “It’s not just me. I want everyone in Oklahoma to stand up and start taking care of this issue.”
Options available
After the event, Sen. David Holt, R-Oklahoma City, said the Legislature doesn’t have to make cuts to the Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services to balance the budget, if his colleagues are willing to reform sales tax exemptions or other tax incentive programs.
But he said he was skeptical that there was enough political leadership to avoid making cuts to White’s agency.
“Unfortunately, I’m not sure if this is a political win,” Holt said.
Constituents are unlikely to vote their representative out of office if the mental health agency’s budget is cut, unlike cuts to the education budget, which frequently motivates voters, he said.
Rep. Doug Cox, R-Grove, said he knows patients he treats in the emergency room need help getting into drug rehabilitation centers to treat opiate addictions. But it is difficult for those patients to get treatment if they don’t have health insurance or enough cash to pay for private services.
Legislators can help increase funding for inpatient rehabilitation care, but that isn’t likely to happen soon, Cox said.
“The Legislature can help fund more treatment beds in the state, when we get past this current fiscal crisis,” he said.