The Reason for the Big Push for a Georgia Mental Health Bill

in 2010 Georgia agreed to release mentally ill patients into the community

Why has dealing with the mentally ill become such an issue before the General Assembly the last couple of years? Consider the following:

1. The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) filed a complaint against the state of Georgia for violating the Americans with Disability Act.

(https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/crt/legacy/2011/01/10/US_v_Georgia_ADAsettle_10-19-10.pdf (page 1, section I, letters A-C).

2. In October of 2010, the State of Georgia came to a settlement with President Obama’s Department of Justice. The DOJ’s Office of Public Affairs announced that this agreement would, “Transform the State of Georgia's mental health and developmental disability system.”

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-obtains-comprehensive-agreement-regarding-state-georgia-s-mental-health

3. By July of 2011, the state of Georgia agreed to stop all State Hospital admissions of individuals with a primary diagnosis of a developmental disability (read the definition in the settlement) and started releasing individuals from the State Hospitals.

https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/crt/legacy/2011/01/10/US_v_Georgia_ADAsettle_10-19-10.pdf ( page 5, number 1, section a)

In January 2010, the Central State Hospital in Milledgeville is downsized.

https://www.ajc.com/lifestyles/health/state-ends-adult-mental-health-services-milledgeville-hospital/C4HyimqoqTIsyvhvfSikNI/

From 2011-2015 Georgia was given a specific number of individuals they must release from the State Hospitals. https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/crt/legacy/2011/01/10/US_v_Georgia_ADAsettle_10-19-10.pdf (page 6, letters A-F)

Under this agreement, those released must be provided state and federal subsidies for community housing, medical, education, transportation, nutrition, and other services.

https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/crt/legacy/2011/01/10/US_v_Georgia_ADAsettle_10-19-10.pdf (page 5-10, section III, number 2)

4. The 2010 settlement required Georgia to provide housing to an estimated 9,000 people with serious mental illness and a “forensic status” (a.k.a. criminal record). The settlement described these individuals as frequently readmitted to the state hospitals, emergency rooms and/or are chronically homeless being released from jails or prisons. (page 11, section B, number 1)

5. These estimated 9,000 people (in 2010) were required to receive “Assertive Community Treatment (ACT).” ACT services would include case management, housing, crisis services and abuse services. These community services needed to be provided 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. (page 12-13, number 2)

Questions Georgia State Senators Must Be Asking:

• Did not this 13-year-old settlement with Obama’s Department of Justice essentially cripple, rather than, “transform Georgia’s Mental Health System?

• Was this settlement handled appropriately through the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities (DBHDD), which was created to manage the 2010 DOJ Settlement?

• Why does Georgia need HB-520 that creates more studies and bureaucracy when an entire department was created in 2010 to manage the Georgia mental health system?

• Did Georgia create the “familiar faces” problem by shutting down its own resources beginning in 2011? If so, the government is merely creating the problem and offering a “solution.”

https://georgiarecorder.com/2020/10/28/georgia-mental-health-services-a-work-in-progress-10-years-after-settlement/

• Knowing all this, and knowing that a need would soon result requiring the monitoring of released mental patients, did sponsors of this bill devise a plan to profit from the required monitoring portion of the 2010 DOJ Settlement and HB-520?

https://hanksullivan.substack.com/p/conflicts-of-interest-hb-520-unnamed

These questions must be answered BEFORE HB520 is passed into law.