CBS won’t let me post its video, so I posted the transcript of its news story below. Meanwhile, take four minutes to watch this interview with my amazing friend. You won’t be disappointed!

(3-25-17-) I’m proud to serve on the Corporation for Supporting Housing board of directors with Dr. Jim O’Connell, a truly wonderful and kind physician who was featured Saturday night on CBS news.  A year ago, I wrote a blog about Jim and his book: STORIES FROM THE SHADOWS. If you really want to understand homelessness and meet those who walk among us unseen, you MUST read his book. (I’ve posted my blog about Jim at the end of the CBS transcript.)

Jim and I work together on the CSH board because we believe we can end homelessness in our country. Let me brag a little. CSH is one of the nation’s leaders in providing supportive housing to the homeless, persons with mental illnesses, individuals with addiction issues, and prisoners returning to our communities.

• We’ve provided loans, grants, project assistance and advocacy creating access to 200,000 homes for those who need housing and important services to achieve stability and transform their lives.
• We’ve made over $500 million in loans and grants.  We’re worked in nearly 40 states, 225 communities, across three regions of the country.
• We’ve presented nearly 1000 training events in the past four years, many through our Supportive Housing Training Center.

CSH is the only board that I serve on and Dr. Connell is one of the reasons why.

You can watch the CBS story here or read the transcript below. 

Meet the Boston Doctor Making House Calls To The Homeless

By Jim Axelrod, CBS News

BOSTON — It’s Friday morning in Boston, which means Dr. Jim O’Connell is making his rounds.

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(3-23-17) I am honored to be speaking tonight on behalf of the Richland, Ohio chapter of the National Alliance On Mental Illness at the now closed Ohio State Reformatory.

This historic prison was featured in the movie, The Shawshank Redemption, and seems a fitting place to talk about our nation’s need to end the inappropriate incarceration of persons with mental illnesses.

Having a mental disorder should not be a crime, yet American jails and prisons hold more than 365.000 persons whose major crime is that they became sick. More than 2.2 million individuals with mental disorders, such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder,  pass through our criminal justice system each year. Nearly all for petty crimes, such a trespassing and theft of a grocery cart, wasting tax dollars that could be better spent on mental health services.

Ohio has been one of the most progressive states in providing mental health care. It is home to my good friend and fellow advocate, retired Supreme Court Justice Evelyn Stratton, as well as, Mark R. Munetz, one of the developers of the sequential intercept model used in jails and prisons, and mental health advocate Dr. Fred Frese.

Despite this, Ohio correctional facilities continue to house five times as many individuals with mental disorders than their hospitals and treatment centers at a cost of $50 million more annually than the price of incarcerating other prisoners.

In the past decade, it often has been courageous judges, jail administrators, police chiefs and sheriffs who have demanded reforms. And I am happy that Fairfax County Sheriff Stacey Kincaid in Virginia has become one of them.

Sheriff Kincaid tossed aside her written speech earlier this week at the Mid-Atlantic Summit on Behavioral Health and Criminal Justice in Washington DC., choosing instead to speak from her heart.

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(2-22-17  The National Alliance on Mental Illness has asked its members to contact their U.S. Representatives and Senators and ask them to vote against repealing the Affordable Care Act on Thursday.

In a message sent to its members and leaders, the national office wrote:

One in five Americans experiences a mental health condition, but only half get needed treatment. Coverage for mental health care helps people get treatment when they need it, helping them to stay in school, on the job and in recovery.

But the American Health Care Act (AHCA) would reduce funding for health coverage–from insurance plans to Medicaid–and put mental health care at risk. It caps Medicaid funding, which will lead to deep cuts and jeopardize mental health services.

Tell your U.S. Representative this is unacceptable.

The request by the nation’s largest grassroots mental health organization includes a form that can be easily filled out. I’ve posted NAMI’s rationale at the bottom of this blog.

The clamor in the media about whether President Trump can corral enough Republican votes to secure passage of his bill reminds me of when I was a young reporter on Capitol Hill and the Carter administration was rallying support for its Panama Canal treaty that many saw as the U.S. giving away the canal that it had built.

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(3-20-17) The mother spoke clearly and with a sense of urgency and fear in her voice.

“Our son has late occurring Schizoaffective disorder which began to be evident seven years ago. He is now 46.

Before he became ill, he graduated from Clemson University and worked in a responsible position. Since 2010, our son has been through a list of events that include being incarcerated, 90 days of rehab, hospitalization twice and consistently suffering from the side effects of his medications. 

However, he has worked hard to become stable and after two years of treatment, he became stable. This was most notable during the presidential election as he remained focused on the candidates, asked questions and actually voted.”

Her voice was followed by a letter from another concerned parent.

“We have a 34 year-old son, Mariano, who was diagnosed with schizophrenia in 2006. As you can imagine this has brought a lot of suffering, especially to him. He has been under the care and supervision of very competent doctors. But, medical care is only a portion for his wellness. Family and community support are also indispensable to establish a purpose in my son’s life and in the lives of individuals like him.

He is now in a program that offered and still offers him the possibility to relearn and retrain the skills and behaviors that the illness took away. His improvement is shown week to week. And that improvement doesn’t occur only because of the medications, it also comes because of the dedication and knowledge of the counselors helping him… Thanks to their almost individualized attention- there are 4 to 6 clients per group- my son has improved significantly. He realizes he is setting goals that can be attained, even though they will take time, but he is learning to veer all of his energy towards his own betterment.

Why, both women asked, is the county about to close down a program that is helping their sons’ recover from the terrible spiral of debilitating mental disorders? Why is there no money? Why is this particular program that has proven to be effective being terminated?

These mothers are demanding answers from elected officials in Fairfax County, Virginia, where I live, but these same questions are being asked across the nation at budget times because of a lack of public funds for mental health and substance abuse care.

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(3-17-17) My Monday blog, which questioned why Rep. Tim Murphy voted along party lines in support of replacing Obamacare with the Republicans health bill, didn’t sit well with the Pennsylvania Republican. Every major mental health group is opposed to the Republican plan because it will end Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion, which covers 1.2 million Americans with serious mental illness and substance abuse problems, as well as, scrap baseline coverage requirements. I am printing Rep. Murphy’s response to the criticism that he has received. It was first posted in The Hill newspaper on Thursday and also sent to me. Early today, the Hill published a response to Rep. Murphy’s. Tim Murphy – Republican Health Bill Fails People With Mental Illness was written by Dr. Richard G. Frank, PhD, the Margaret T. Morris Professor of Health Economics in the Department of Health Care Policy at Harvard Medical School. Here are the pro and con.)

Transforming Mental Health & Addiction Treatment: We’ve Only Just Begun

By Rep. Tim Murphy

As Congress delivers on the promise of delivering relief from the collapsing Affordable Care Act (ACA), we must be forward thinking and avoid re-purposing yesterday’s failed policies to solve today’s problems. In particular, we must include better strategies to advance mental health and addiction treatment.

While promising mental health and addiction insurance coverage, the ACA did little to provide real medical models of treatment for those suffering with mental illness and addiction. The evidence is staggering: skyrocketing rates of suicide and drug overdose deaths are now at all-time highs. 
 
Sadly, only lip service was paid to behavioral health by the previous administration’s whose agenda furthered the familiar pattern of limiting access to treatment, casting millions to the shadows of our healthcare system and dragging their feet on the implementation of mental health laws.

In a calculated move to save money in the Medicare program, the Obama administration attempted to strip the protected drug class status for life-saving psychiatric medications.

Following outrage from advocates and an explosive exchange I had with former CMS Deputy Administrator Jonathan Blum at an Energy & Commerce hearing, the cruel effort was abandoned. But the point was clear: mental illness remains a disease considered less important than physical disease.

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(3-13-17) What are we to think about Pennsylvania Republican Rep. Tim Murphy’s vote last week in the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee to repeal the Affordable Care Act?

Ever since the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings in 2012, Murphy has been a Capitol Hill champion for individuals with mental illnesses and their families. His dogged determination lead to passage of the Helping Families in Mental Health Crisis Act during the lame duck session in December, a major reform of mental health laws.

Yet last week, he voted along partisan lines to reject Obamacare – a move that every, yes, every major mental health organization strongly opposes.

The Republican’s repeal legislation as currently written will end Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion, which covers 1.2 million Americans with serious mental illness and substance abuse problems, as well as, scrap baseline coverage requirements. It also will do damage to mental health parity. These changes mean certain beneficiaries will no longer get coverage for mental health and substance abuse treatments guaranteed under the Affordable Care Act.

There are Republicans resisting Trump Care. Four Senate Republicans told Politico’s Brianna Ehley that they are deeply concerned about their party’s American Health Care Act (AHCA), which will replace Obamacare. In a letter to  Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, they declared  “reform should not come at the cost of disruption in access to healthcare for our country’s most vulnerable and sickest individuals.”

Senator Chris Murphy (D.-Conn.), who championed the Senate version of  the Helping Families In Mental Health Crisis act, predicted dire consequences in Politico if the Medicaid expansion is ended.

“Emergency rooms better start staffing up because their psychiatric units are going to be overflowing.”

Here’s what mental health groups have said about the Republican’s legislation.

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