[NYAPRS Enews] Peyser Calls AH Residents "Army of the Damned', Garaufis "Bully'

Mon Mar 8 10:54:20 EST 2010

Judge's Ruling Is Insanity 

By Andrea Peyser New York Post March 8, 2010

The army of the damned is about to grow stronger. 

On stoops in places like Washington Heights, they sit and smoke for days
on end, talking to themselves or begging for change. One day in 2005,
one of these faceless, unmedicated and unsupervised men flipped out and
stabbed a baby. 

And now, the number of lost souls is set to skyrocket to levels unseen
since the 1980s, when alleys were lined with bodies and roads were ruled
by squeegee extortionists. For that, we owe thanks to a federal judge.
Let's give a big round of applause to Nicholas Garaufis! 

You might have heard of Brooklyn's bully. Garaufis is the man who set
quotas for hiring minorities in the Fire Department -- despite a lack of
evidence that discrimination exists. This month, the activist jurist
ordered Albany to start moving 4,300 mentally ill adults from the group
homes in which they currently live into "supported" apartments where
they'll dwell independently, "integrated" into the community. Or so we
hope. 

Garaufis was angry. "Frankly incredulous," he wrote, that New York was
doing little to put the mass of humanity out of group homes that are
staffed 24 hours a day. He wants them living alone in apartments where
they'll receive regular visits from staff members. That is, if the
mentally ill allow staffers inside. 

He didn't explain where he would get the fairy dust to magically turn
these hurting humans into productive citizens. 

Activists for the mentally ill rejoiced. But residents in afflicted
neighborhoods, families of the sick -- and the ill themselves -- are
panic stricken. 

And, as I've recently learned, Judge Garaufis has a potential conflict
of interest here. 

He is married to Elizabeth Seidman, who is on the board of directors of
Fountain House -- which supplies the very "supported" housing units to
the city that the judge so loves. 

How did this happen? In response to my query, Judge Garaufis faxed me a
transcript from a 2007 court hearing in which he disclosed his potential
husband-wife conflict to lawyers in the case. 

"I want to give a notice of this, although I don't think it has any
effect on my ability to decide the case," he said. No one objected and
nothing changed. Garaufis refused further comment. 

As word of the judge's ruling spread, horror ran through neighborhoods
where group homes are destined for the wrecking ball. 

"We'll go to the site and maybe do a teach-in with some of the people
there. Ask them, 'Are you ready?' " said Councilman James Sanders Jr. of
Queens. 

As a resident of a Far Rockaway group home, Robert Evans, put it: "These
people don't even know how to shower or shave, and they certainly don't
know how to shop or cook." 

Garaufis micromanaged the extent to which operators of supported housing
may go to persuade reluctant residents of group homes to come with them.
"Adult-home residents will likely require multiple meetings or
discussions, and perhaps even trips to see what supported-housing
apartments look like," he ruled. 

"Basically, the judge gave them the authority to harass these residents
until they say yes," said Jeffrey Edelman, owner of the Wavecrest home
in Queens and one in The Bronx. He said creating some 4,500 units of
supported housing will cost taxpayers hundreds of millions -- or more. 

In the name of civil rights for the mentally ill, we're moving backward.
Group homes were once considered a pleasant alternative to mental
institutions. Supported housing has been a failure in Washington
Heights, where residents hang out on streets, and neighbors avoid them.
So much for "integrating" into the community. 

Occasionally, someone refuses his medication, to disastrous effect.
Bernard Derr went off his meds, and stabbed a baby in the stomach. 

Group homes are not perfect, but they're not the hell pits of
yesteryear. 

They are the kindest solution for those who need help. 

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/judge_ruling_is_insanity_K68goo14Y5gV
UqbciPED1J

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

NYAPRS Note: We need our readers who support the rights of people with
psychiatric and other disabilities to live in dignity and recovery in
the community to support Judge Nicholas Garaufis' landmark ruling by
weighing in by adding your voice to comments to recent articles in the
NYC/NYS media that wrongly suggest that adult home residents cannot be
supported in the community and need to 'age in place' forever in the
profitable homes. Help us stand up to the NYC tabloids who regularly
mischaracterize people with psychiatric disabilities as too frail,
feeble or dangerous to live in the community....this is reminiscent of
the racist or sexist subtones that are no longer permissible in today's
media but often done to us.

Public opinion is always very important...no more so than now, when we
are on the heels of unprecedented judicial support for the ADA rights of
people with disabilities to live in the most integrated setting in the
community. 

Please go to the following links and add your voice today to counteract
some of the bilge that's in the headlines and below the articles.
Thanks!!

http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2010/03/06/2010-03-06_judged_crazy.h
tml

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/editorials/the_coming_homeless_boom
_5T3ecpRS9jzmTStutw6wxH

http://gothamist.com/2010/03/01/mentally_ill_new_yorkers_to_live_in.php#
comments

http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/queens/2010/03/03/2010-03-03_no_pati
ent_patience_many_skeptical_of_order_for_mentally_ill.html

http://polhudson.lohudblogs.com/2010/03/03/state-appeals-ruling-in-case-
on-adult-homes/

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/MindMoodNews/judge-mentally-ill-move-adult-
homes-neighborhoods/story?id=10003629
<http://abcnews.go.com/Health/MindMoodNews/judge-mentally-ill-move-adult
-homes-neighborhoods/story?id=10003629&page=4> &page=4

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/brooklyn/housing_win_for_mentally_ill
_dzSMwYVCkSpkQEzx1dmO0J

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/03/02/state-told-to-change-how-th
e-mentally-ill-are-housed/

http://www.nynp.biz/index.php/breaking-news/2113-judge-orders-4500-suppo
rtive-housing-units-for-adult-home-residents

http://motherjones.com/mojo/2010/03/ny-disabled-adults-win-court-ruling

http://www.gothamgazette.com/blogs/wonkster/2010/03/01/state-must-provid
e-mentally-ill-with-supported-housing/

Federal Court Orders N.Y. To Move Adult Home Residents With MI Into
Community

N.Y. Advocates (See) Victory Over Court's Remedy Order

Mental Health Weekly March 8, 2010

New York mental health and disability rights advocates are hailing an
important victory for adult home residents with psychiatric
disabilities, following a federal judge's ruling last week ordering
state officials to afford all qualified residents the opportunity to
move from institutional settings into supported housing in the
community.

U.S. District Judge Nicholas Garaufis ruled March 1 that the state must
create housing with 1,500 beds in each of the next three years. He ruled
that state officials must change the way they manage their mental health
system in order for adult home residents to have a choice to receive the
services to which they are entitled to in supported housing rather than
an adult home.

The court also ruled that no individual with mental illness who is
qualified for supported housing is offered placement in an adult home
unless, after being fully informed, he or she declines the opportunity
to receive services in supported housing.

The court's remedy follows last year's historic ruling by Garaufis that
the state had violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the
Rehabilitation Act by housing more than 4,300 consumers with mental
illness in large nursing homes rather than integrating them into the
community (see MHW, Sept. 14, 2009).

Disability Advocates, Inc., (DAI) a non-profit group had filed a lawsuit
in 2003, DAI v. Paterson, on behalf of the residents residing in 28
adult homes in New York City, alleging that the homes lack the staff,
resources or mandate to provide integrated housing and services to
promote community living.

The State subsequently proposed its own remedial plan as mandated by the
September court ruling and called for the New York Office of Mental
Health (OMH) to fund 200 new units of supported housing each year for
five years beginning in fiscal year 2010-2011 for a total of 1,000 new
units. Advocates took issue with the plan, saying it "fell short" of the
judge's decision to address the housing needs of adult home residents
(see MHW, Nov. 23, 2009).

In last week's ruling, Garaufis said it was "incredulous that defendants
sincerely believed this proposal would suffice." New York State after
reviewing the federal district court's ruling has filed a notice of
appeal, Jill Daniels, OMH director of public affairs, told MHW.

"This is a very wrong decision," Jeffrey Edelman, president of the Board
of the New York Coalition for Quality Assisted Living, which represents
adult home owners and facilities. "It's taking away a very important
choice. Most residents are unable to live on their own." Edelman said
residents are living in integrated communities. "They're supervised, but
they're also extremely integrated in the community," he told MHW. We're
in the middle of a residential community."

State Requirements

Among other things, the order requires the state to:

* Ensure that within four years, all qualified adult home residents are
afforded placement in supported housing if they want it.

* Contract with supported housing providers to conduct "inreach" to
adult home residents to engage them, develop  relationships with them,
build trust, provide information and actively support them in moving to
supported housing.

* Court will appoint a monitor to oversee compliance.

"The court's remedy order brings us one step closer to a model mental
health system that provides supported housing for people with mental
illness," Jeanette Zelhof, deputy director, MFY Legal Services, Inc.,
which represented DAI in the lawsuit, told MHW. The ruling is expected
to have a "ripple effect" and could serve as a national model,
especially after the New York Department of Justice intervened in the
lawsuit in late 2009 during the remedial phase, said Zelhof. "New York
has set a precedent for other states around the country," she said.

Cliff Zucker, executive director of Disability Advocates, Inc. agrees
that the court's final remedial order will have a national impact. "It's
going to make a huge difference for thousands of people currently housed
in institutions and give them the opportunity of living a life of
freedom in an integrated setting," he said. Some of the residents
testified "very movingly" during the trial last year about their desire
to live in more integrated communities, said Zucker. Former adult home
residents now living in some of the state's 60 supported housing units,
testified that living in integrated settings has made a big difference
in their life, he said.

Harvey Rosenthal, chief executive of New York Association for
Psychiatric Rehabilitation Services (NYAPRS), said he is somewhat
surprised the state revealed its plans to appeal after (only) two days
of the court's decision. "It is very disturbing that the state has not
found the political will to redirect millions of dollars they committed
to housing adult home residents and moving them into community settings"
with that funding, Rosenthal told MHW.

Olmstead Impact

Advocates long believed that the federal lawsuit represented the state's
failure to comply with the Supreme Court's 1999 Olmstead v. L.C.
decision, which suggested that states demonstrate compliance with the
ADA by producing formal plans for increasing community integration.
"Many people have been under the misimpression that the Olmstead
decision doesn't require states to do very much," Jennifer Mathis,
deputy legal director for the Judge David L. Bazelon Center for Mental
Health Law, told MHW. The DAI decision and the court's remedy order make
it clear that that is incorrect, she stated.

"This is an extremely important ruling," said Mathis "It reaffirms the
importance of integration as a civil right and lays out the types of
measures that states may need to take in order to comply with Olmstead."
Many states have wrongly looked at Olmstead compliance as a costly
measure, she said. "To the contrary; complying with Olmstead typically
saves states money. It's about people's civil rights."

"The fact is that it is a cost savings to comply with Olmstead if they
actually reallocated their resources from institutional settings to
community settings," she said. 

New York has some of the leading supported housing providers in the
country, said Mathis. "They know how to serve a wide range of people
with mental illness - including people with very challenging needs -
effectively in supported housing," she said. 

Mathis added, "New York must now expand that supported housing capacity
so that people with mental illness can have a meaningful choice and can
live in supported housing rather than being stuck in adult homes." 

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