Brighter Futures Begin with HOPE.

One agency where state budget cuts may have finally cut too deep is the Mississippi Department of Mental Health (DMH). The DMH has already undergone nearly $59 million in cuts from Fiscal Year (FY) 2009 to FY 2011. The table below shows how the DMH’s budget has changed in the last two years.

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Department of Mental Health General Fund Appropriations, 2009-2011

These cuts have already resulted in reduced services in many areas such as:

• Reduction of 200 beds at the state mental health hospital
• Closing of a dorm at the Mississippi Adolescent Center in Brookhaven
• Closing of 24 supervised apartments at the Central Mississippi Residential Center
• Closing of some early intervention programs
• Reduced grants to some nonprofits that provide services

Add to that the proposed closure of four primarily state-funded facilities and the future of those currently receiving services becomes bleak. In the absence of options, many patients currently served by the mental health system could become homeless or end up in the state’s corrections system.

Neither local law enforcement nor community-based mental healthcare systems are currently equipped to handle the volume of mental patients these closures may create.

Source:

MEPC analysis of data from the Enacted Budget 2010, Governor’s Office data 2009 and 2010, and the SB 3143 Conference Report