Mental health, addiction funding increase is `good step forward'

A $14 million increase for mental health and addiction programs in the new state budget “is another good step forward ,” Commissioner Terri White said Friday during a meeting of the Board of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services.

The increase brings the agency's total budget to $351,218,376 for the fiscal year that begins July 1.

“This is another good step forward. I'm grateful for every step that is a step forward,” she said. “I always wish we were taking giant steps forward each year, but the Legislature and the governor took some good steps forward this year.”

The agency requested a $ 1 6 3 million increase White in fund

i ng for the new fiscal year, including $91 million for its Smart on Crime programs to divert nonviolent offenders needing mental health and/ or addiction treatment away from the criminal justice system. It received $10 million for the diversion services, which range fro mp revention to intervention to reintegration.

The new state funding also includes $500,000 to continue a suicide prevention program that was funded for years by a federal grant t hat was not renewed.

The remainder of the increase is" just making sure we have the ability to serve the same number of people next year that we're serving this year, knowing that certain prices change and the federal match and all those types of things," White said.

Current resources do not meet the needs of everyone who requires services.

The agency, for example, contracts with providers for indigent people who need residential substance abuse treatment. For every person in treatment, another person is on the waiting list for a bed to come open.

The waiting list on Thursday had 158 women — eight are pregnant — and 415 men, said Carrie Slatton-Hodges, deputy commissioner for treatment and recovery services.

Of the total, 51 women and 81 men are intravenous drug users. The priority when a bed comes open is pregnant women and IV drug users.

For men who are not on the top of list, the average wait for admission to a treatment center is 230 days, S lat ton-Hodges said.

"That's where we lose people. That' s where people overdose. That's where people end up in the prison system instead of being able to live their life in recovery," she said. "This is the one that has concerned us the most for years."

Medicaid dose not pay for residential substance abuse treatment, so the agency must cover it using 100% state dollars, White said.