A diverse group of 100 elected county officials, mental health care providers, county law enforcement officials and consumers came together for two-and-a-half days to discuss the state of mental health services in Montana and to ensure that the county voice is heard in the next legislative session.
The gathering took place at a Mental Health Summit, sponsored by The Montana Association of Counties (MACo), March 22—24 in Lewis and Clark County (Helena).
Yellowstone County Commissioner Bill Kennedy, chair, MACo Health and Human Services Committee, has been working with county officials across the state of Montana to raise awareness of the emerging mental health crisis. Although counties play a key role in the delivery of mental health services, Kennedy felt there was a lack of understanding in the state legislature about what counties have been facing regarding the mental health issue. There was also growing concern about the increasing numbers of individuals going into the state mental health hospital because of the lack of mental illness treatment resources in rural Montana counties.
Montana faces a serious shortfall in funding for mental health services, an overcrowded jail system, and an overcrowded state hospital system. Additionally, police officers increasingly have to deal with cases involving people with mental illness — a job for which they are not properly trained, Kennedy explained.
The summit provided an opportunity for county officials and other leaders to go into the next legislative session well prepared and coordinated with the goal of improving the system. One of the challenges before this group was to work on a strategy for how to continue providing a mental health safety-net for the 56 counties in Montana.
The summit also provided the opportunity for the participants to look at innovative local solutions that counties could implement to address many of these challenges.
Featured speaker Judge Steven Leifman, Miami-Dade County, Fla., talked about how Miami-Dade’s Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) approach to diverting individuals with mental illness away from the criminal justice system has yielded tremendous results. Workers-compensation claims have been significantly reduced, the number of police calls for dealing with persons with mental illness is down because more people are in treatment, and overall liability for the community is reduced because there have been no lawsuits against the criminal justice system.
Leifman also spoke about using community resources already in place such as local hospitals, universities and health-related foundations. "Miami-Dade did not have a penny when we started their program. We took existing resources and made them work better for us. You don’t necessarily need new programs," Leifman said. "This is a community problem and it needs a community solution." For example, a hospital in Miami-Dade offered to provide training on mental health issues to law-enforcement personnel at no charge.
Kennedy said, "What is significant about Judge Leifman’s approach is that he brought all the players on board. He went to talk to the police departments and he spoke to different police chiefs. He showed everybody what was in his or her best interest Ñ which led people to come to the table as a partner."
According to Leifman, "Groups like this are meeting all around the country. We’re finally starting to realize that people with mental illness who go untreated can end up accessing everyone’s limited resources — and that we should do something before that happens."