The NY Times published an article about the recent lawsuit against the state on behalf of inmates with psychiatric disabilities who are kept past their release dates because there is nowhere for them to go. It is another Olmstead lawsuit blaming the state for not having enough housing for people with mental illnesses so that they end up staying in institutional care, i.e., adult homes, nursing homes, and now jails and prisons.
I talked at length to the reporter so that she understood the system and although we talked about rates, I knew it was not the focus of the article, lack of enough housing was. Despite that, she put in a quote about the rates from me at the end (see below). I’ll take it!
– Toni
“But waiting lists have grown longer as the state has eliminated beds from its psychiatric hospitals. The roughly 44,000 spaces available for the mentally ill are about half of what is needed, said Antonia Lasicki, the executive director of the Association for Community Living, which represents supportive-housing operators.
Despite the state’s commitment to build more supportive housing, the creation of units has not kept pace with demand, and existing facilities are struggling to stay open, Ms. Lasicki and other advocates said. State funding “is barely enough to cover the rent,” she said.
“So that’s the problem right there in the nutshell,” Ms. Lasicki added. “They’re very underfunded.”