[NYAPRS Enews] Housing Advocates Storm Albany in Historic Rally Day, Housing Wait List Bill Reintroduced

[Harvey Rosenthal]

NYAPRS Note: Mental health advocates and self-advocates for housing
stormed Albany last week in the largest single mental health-related
demonstration in the past 30 years and, probably, ever. Over 1,500
filled the Legislative Office Building's 'Well' to overflowing while
over 50 meetings with Administration and Legislative officials were
being held to press for over 35,000 new housing opportunities over the
next decade as well as  improvements to current housing and to community
housing service models. Over 600 of the inspired, tireless band then
gathered outside the Capitol steps for a half hour more of speakers and
chants, culminating in a spirited march around the Capitol building.

Last Tuesday was truly a historic day...for surely the need for improved
and expanded housing for New Yorkers with psychiatric disabilities has
never been made more forcefully and impressively. All eyes look forward
to this Wednesday's release of Governor Spitzer's first Executive Budget
proposal for signs that housing is in the forefront of the Governor's
mental health agenda...and to the Legislature's anticipated re-passing
of the Housing Wait List Bill that was introduced last week by Senate
Mental Health Committee Chairman Thomas Morahan and will be moved in the
Assembly by Mental Health Committee Chairman Peter Rivera (see below for
a summary).

Great thanks to the extraordinary effort by all of the dedicated members
of the NYS Campaign for Mental Health Housing....and to all of the
NYAPRS members who came out to support the day's events and whose
efforts were supported by our own Public Policy Committee Co-Chair Vuka
Stricevic of Community Access.

 

Hundreds Rally For Mental Health Housing

by SARI ZEIDLER  Legislative Gazette   Mon, Jan 29, 2007

 

 Almost a thousand people showed up in Albany last Tuesday to
participate in what the New York State Campaign for Mental Health
Housing called the largest rally for a mental health cause in state
history. 

 

Attendees filled the well of the Legislative Office Building yelling
"size matters" in an attempt to persuade Gov. Eliot Spitzer to set aside
$100 million in the 2007-08 budget for mental health housing.

 

Mental Health advocates from all over the state gathered in the
Legislative Office Building and then outside of the Capitol to show
support for their cause. Steve Coe, chairman of the New York State
Campaign for Mental Health Housing, which represents tens of thousands
of mental health consumers, providers, family members and advocates,
outlined their proposals for the $100 million. 

 

A number of supporters, including several elected officials, spoke on
the need for more housing resources. 

 

"This is great," Sen. Paul Tonko yelled to a sea of supporters who
spilled down the marble staircase and filled the well of the Legislative
Office Building. This is "what's fair, what's right, what's necessary,"
he exclaimed.

 

Bright green t-shirts with the words New York State Campaign for Mental
Health Housing peppered the halls of the Empire State Plaza Concourse
for hours as attendees made their presence known in the Capitol.

 

"Preserve, reform, develop!" was shouted by rally members as a concise
description of what they hope to achieve.

 

In addition to the lobbyists' request for the development of 35,000
units of supported housing they want to preserve 30,000 existing housing
units. Another request made by the group was the reform of existing
housing to provide better service to occupants.

Antonia Lasicki, executive director of the Association for Community
Living, said reform is necessary in existing housing because they "have
been under funded year after year since 1984. We need to reform
residence modules that were created in the 80s and are no longer
responsive to all the consumers in the system." She also added "There
are thousands of people in shelters, on the streets, in hospitals who
could live successfully in the community if we had the right supports."

 

Lasicki's claim is an important feature of the University of
Pennsylvania study that suggests shuffling people from hospitals to
shelters can be expensive for taxpayers. Copies of statistics from the
study were included as handouts that stated it would only cost an extra
$995 per year to offer appropriate housing downstate and even less
Upstate. 

 

"It's the humane thing to do and it's the cost-effective thing do," said
J. David Seay, executive director of the National Alliance of Mental
Illness - New York State. Seay also pointed to the fact that recovery
for the mentally ill is possible for even severe cases "though it isn't
possible to achieve any significant form of recovery if you don't have a
place to live."

 

Assemblyman Jim Brennan, D-Brooklyn, who showed up to the event
proclaimed, "over the past 12 years because of rallies like this... you
succeeded over the negligence of the Pataki administration. But the
fight is far from over."

 

The mental health community has made advances attaining supportive
housing in recent years with victories such as the NYNYI and NYNYII
initiatives that brought supportive housing units to New York City.
However, the New York State Campaign for Mental Health Housing maintains
that 35,000 units of supportive housing are needed statewide. 

 

Former Gov. George Pataki vetoed a bill commonly known as "the wait
bill" last year that would make the state responsible for generating a
waiting list for people in need of supportive housing, even though it
passed in both houses. It would provide more accurate statistics than
those available now.

 

Sen. Tom Morahan, R,C,I,WF-New City, chairman of the Senate mental
health committee, said he filed the bill last Monday hoping to get it in
early. He suggested concerns about the "quality of reporting" might have
been a deterrent for the former governor, but stated "It is my intention
to get this bill out in a form that will meet the needs of the
legislative branch."

 

The Rally culminated in a speech on the steps of the Capitol building
where mentally ill individuals described the experience of being placed
in inadequate housing as being "railroaded" or "warehoused."

 

Following the speech, rally members marched around the building and
through the Justice building in a final act of support before leaving
Albany.

 

http://www.legislativegazette.com/printable.php?id=1940 

-----------

 

Don't Leave Us Out In The Cold

Housing Advocates For The Mentally Ill Protest In Albany To Highlight
The Need For Reform

by David Canfield   Metroland Magazine   January 25, 2007 

 

'Housing for special needs is an extremely important area, and the
Pataki administration did not invest in it," said state Sen. Velmanette
Montgomery (D-Brooklyn), a member of the Senate Committee on Mental
Health and Developmental Disabilities. Gov. Eliot Spitzer already has
expressed an interest in this issue, Montgomery said, an issue that
former Gov. George Pataki ignored for too long. 

 

On Tuesday, supporters of housing for the mentally ill gathered in
Albany to call on Spitzer and the state Legislature to include $100
million in the upcoming state budget to maintain existing housing for
those with mental disabilities and to fund new construction. Montgomery
was one of many public figures who spoke at the rally. 

 

The event, organized by the New York State Campaign for Mental Health
Housing, began in the well of the Legislative Office Building in Albany.
The area was crowded wall-to-wall with supporters, most wearing
lime-green shirts proclaiming "The road to recovery starts with a good
home." 

 

The event drew people from around the state as well as many from the
Capital Region. Genevieve Plair, 36, grew up in foster care due to her
mother's schizophrenia. When she was too old for foster care and still
had nowhere to go, she lived in a group home.

 

Plair, who gave up her three children due to her own mental illness, now
lives in a homeless shelter in Albany. Her current situation, as well as
her history with the financial and emotional problems caused by mental
illness, is what led her to Tuesday's rally. Plair herself is in need of
housing; she said she must be out of the homeless shelter by April 1.

 

"It's very difficult trying to find an apartment," she said. "I just
don't want to live in a rat trap." Plair wants a decent place to live
where her children can come to visit and be comfortable. "I don't want
some place where there are roaches or mice crawling around." 

 

Likewise, Schenectady resident Roy Neville, who spoke at the event, has
experience with the need for housing for the mentally ill. Neville has
two children with schizophrenia, one in Albany and one in Schenectady,
who live in housing provided by nonprofit groups. Neville stresses the
importance of housing as the backbone to a stable life. "It's made all
the difference in the world for my two kids, and all the others who have
a stable place to live," he said. "They can do OK."

 

He said that different illnesses and different situations require a wide
variety of options. More options would give the mentally disabled "a
chance to be as normal as the rest of us and get along with other
people, get some insight, be voters, be workers and good neighbors," he
said. "We don't want people in institutions."

 

Neville is grateful that his children are lucky enough to have
apartments provided by nonprofit mental-health groups, but recognizes
that many are less fortunate. "It's a good system," he said. "It's just
not enough for everybody."

 

Currently there are more than 10,000 homeless New Yorkers suffering from
mental illness. Thousands of others are living in shelters, hospitals,
or adult homes. The Campaign for Mental Health Housing said that 35,000
new units are needed. 

 

"In the previous administration, the Office of Mental Health
commissioner was brought in with a clear mandate that OMH was not in the
housing business, and housing was not an issue that they should concern
themselves with," said campaign chairman Steve Coe. "So there was no
attention paid to the issue. In the last three of four years, nothing
has moved forward."

 

This inaction motivated the group to stage Tuesday's event, the largest
gathering for the issue that Coe has seen in 30 years. He says that
almost 1,600 people registered to attend the event, which featured
numerous speakers from the Legislature and culminated with a rally in
front of the Capitol. 

 

A megaphone was passed around on the steps of the Capitol, and when one
attendee asked how many members of the crowd had ended up in an adult
home due to their mental illness, the crowd responded with a sizeable
amount of raised hands. The same was true when the crowd was asked about
being forced to live in homeless shelters and hospitals.

 

Before marching around the building, supporters arranged themselves in
the shape of a house, hoping to make the image visible from the windows
of the Capitol building. Someone shouted to Gov. Spitzer, in absentia,
to please "not be another Gov. Pataki." That seemed to be the sentiment
among supporters: hope for change in the future, but still a fear of
being let down by the state once again.

 

http://www.metroland.net/newsfront.html#1 

 

---------------

 

BILL NUMBER: S568 

SPONSOR: MORAHAN 

TITLE OF BILL: An act to amend the mental hygiene law, in relation to
the establishment of community housing waiting lists for adults within
the office of mental health service system 

PURPOSE: This legislation would enable the state to track the wait time
for persons with psychiatric disabilities seeking supportive, supervised
or congregate housing in the office of mental health system. 

SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS: - Amends section 7.15 of the mental hygiene law,
providing for establishing waiting lists. 

- Defines terms "provider of housing services" and "agency or
institution". 

- The agency shall forward for collection names of the applicants to the
office of mental health. 

- The Commissioner shall prepare a written report on the community
housing waiting list. The report shall be submitted to the governor and
the legislature. 

JUSTIFICATION: There is a great need for the establishment of a waiting
list that would truly reflect the need for housing and related services
for people in New York with mental disabilities, and also match those
people up with appropriate housing, in the most integrated setting. This
bill would help to bring the state in line with the already-existing
obligations under the federal Americans with Disabilities Act, the
Supreme Court's decision in Olmstead v. L.C., and New York State
Executive Law sections 701-703. 

LEGISLATIVE HISTORY: Same as S.3653-A of 2005-06 veto #323 of 2006. 

FISCAL IMPLICATIONS: To be determined. 

EFFECTIVE DATE: Immediately.

 

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