Spinning Wheeler - County Chair to Talk Mental Health
Portland Mercury, November 21, 2007 - County Chair Ted Wheeler has accepted an invitation by mental health activists to attend a public meeting to discuss his apparent failure, so far, to prioritize a sub-acute facility for the mentally ill in Portland.
Wheeler told the Mercury at the end of last month he might not secure funding for such a facility—where police officers could take people in mental health crisis instead of jail—until 2010. November 2008 is the very earliest he could secure funding, Wheeler said.
Nevertheless, on October 4, Wheeler voted against a proposal by County Commissioner Lisa Naito to fund such a center by diverting $4 million of county subsidies from Gresham ["Less Than a Crisis?" News, Nov 1].
Reopening a sub-acute facility—Portland has been missing its crisis triage center since 2003—was a key priority of Mayor Tom Potter's Mental Health/Public Safety Initiative formed last fall, following the death in police custody last September of the 42-year-old schizophrenic, James Chasse Jr.
Portland Mental Health Association President Roy Silberstein wrote to Wheeler last Friday, November 16, inviting him to hold a public meeting to explain his "plans to make the opening of a sub-acute facility a high priority."
"Since the closure of the Crisis Triage Center in 2003," Silberstein wrote, "people with mental illness, their friends and family members, mental health clinicians, first responders, and a variety of others have experienced or witnessed a high number of bad outcomes which could have been avoided had a psychiatric sub-acute facility been an option."
Wheeler's office agreed to the meeting this Tuesday, November 20—to take place on January 18, 2008, at 6 pm.
"I think it's very encouraging that they want to meet their constituents to talk about their decisions," says Jason Renaud of the Mental Health Association. Wheeler himself did not return the Mercury's call by press time, but a spokesman confirmed the meeting will take place.
Our Letter to Ted Wheeler
Chair Ted Wheeler
Multnomah County Board of County Commissioners
501 SE Hawthorne, Suite 600
Portland, OR 97214
SENT BY REGISTERED LETTER, EMAIL AND POSTED ON OUR WEB SITE
11/16/07
Dear Ted,
This letter is a formal and public invitation to attend a public meeting to discuss the decision of the County Commission on October 3 to not endorse a proposal to create a psychiatric sub-acute facility, as defined in Commissioner Lisa Naito’s proposal.
We hope to hear your plans at this meeting to make the opening of a psychiatric sub-acute facility a high priority.
Opening a psychiatric sub-acute facility in Multnomah County was a key recommendation of Tom Potter’s Mental Health / Public Safety Initiative, which you helped form and were a member. The Mental Health / Public Safety Initiative formed one year ago in the wake of the death of James Chasse in September 2006. Its purpose was to take immediate actions to improve how the local and regional mental health and public safety systems work together.
Since the closing of the Crisis Triage Center in 2003, people with mental illness, their friends and family members, mental health clinicians, first responders and variety of others have experienced or witnessed a high number of bad outcomes which could have been avoided had a psychiatric sub-acute facility been an option.
Because of this discrepancy between public interest and the decision of the Commission, we hope as Chair of the Commission you are willing to meet with interested persons, speak about your decision, and listen to the experience and concerns of your constituents.
If you’re willing to attend a public meeting, help make this meeting meaningful to a majority of interested persons by agreeing to hold the meeting in a sufficiently large and public place, with immediate access to public transit, that the meeting take place in the early evening, and, finally that the meeting be videotaped and the videotape be broadcast immediately and indefinitely via the County web site.
Thanks so much for your time and quick response.
Roy Silberstein, President
Mental Health Association of Portland
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