Mental health facing $20M cut
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By DANIEL BARLOW Vermont Press Bureau - Published: December 1, 2009
MONTPELIER — The state of Vermont is considering a nearly $20 million cut to mental health services in its next budget, a reduction that advocates say could result in up to 3,000 people across the state losing services.
State officials outlined proposed cuts to lawmakers and mental health advocates at a meeting last week about the future of the Vermont State Hospital in Waterbury, the facility that serves people with severe cases of mental illness.
Cuts under discussion by Gov. James Douglas' administration include $10.5 million from the state's Community Rehabilitation and Treatment program and a $2.7 million cut in funding for adult outpatient care, which will eliminate all state funding for that program.
The proposals have shocked mental health advocates.
"This would be the equivalent of having emergency rooms at local hospitals open only one day a week," said Ken Libertoff, the executive director of the Vermont Association for Mental Health, a Montpelier advocacy organization. "If these cuts go through, it would effectively end Vermont's four-decade era of commitment to community mental health."
Vermont's 2011 budget problem will likely be the top issue in the new legislative session in January and the proposals to trim the state's mental health services — the Vermont Department of Mental Health's annual budget is about $157 million — is the first glimpse at just how far some cuts may go.
According to advocates who were at the meeting last week where the numbers were unveiled, the proposal also calls for a $1.7 million cut in funding to the State Hospital and a $5.5 million cut from children's services.
Michael Hartman, the commissioner of the Mental Health Department, said much of the cuts come from an unexpected upcoming reduction in Medicare funding the state will see from the federal government.
Hartman said the state saw an increase in Medicare funding for mental health services as part of President Obama's economic stimulus plan — money that will drop in next year's budget and be eliminated completely in the budget year following that.
"It's up to the White House and Congress to decide if they will take this money back," Hartman said.
These cuts would be devastating to Vermont's community mental health system, according to Margaret Joyal, the director of outpatient services for the Washington County Mental Health Services.
Over the last year, Washington County Mental Health has seen more than 800 people come in through the doors needing a total of 8,500 services, she said. Statewide, about 20 to 30 percent of the people community mental health centers see don't have health insurance, she added.
"I would have to cut my staff," Joyal said of the affect the proposed cuts would have on the organization's budget. "I'm not even sure if we could exist anymore with these cuts."
Reports of these proposed cuts come less than a week after the Burlington Police Chief Michael Scherling warned lawmakers that cuts to the state's mental health services so far have resulted in a cost-shift onto law enforcement and the courts.
"I predict that this move would cost the state of Vermont more money down the road," Joyal said. "In six months to a year, we'll really see these costs show up."
Hartman — who said these proposed cuts are part of a budgeting exercise that the state is now undergoing — said there will be "dramatic" changes to Vermont's mental health system as the state struggles with its budget crisis.
He said that $1.5 million of the proposed cuts to outpatient adult services would be used to boost the efforts of emergency crisis teams that would be called to assist in mental health and substance abuse emergencies.
Rep. Michael Fisher, D-Lincoln, a member of the Legislature's Mental Health Oversight Committee, said "there is no doubt that these cuts will result in people out there not getting the treatment they need and not getting better."
"A budget cut like this one would undermine the entire community mental health system," Fisher said.
daniel.barlow@timesargus.com
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