Report: Citizens Committee Recommends Capital Area Human Services District to Manage Funds and Programming if Mental Health Tax Proposal Passes

28 Nov Report: Citizens Committee Recommends Capital Area Human Services District to Manage Funds and Programming if Mental Health Tax Proposal Passes

Baton Rouge, La. – The Committee to Support Equitable Healthcare for All has released a report outlining five
specific concerns regarding plans for funding of the so-called Bridge Center should the upcoming mental health
tax proposal that is on the December 8 ballot for East Baton Rouge Parish voters pass.

The report, entitled “Right Goal, Wrong Delivery: An Evaluation of a Proposal to Continue a Two-Tier Health Care
System in East Baton Rouge Parish” focuses on the issues related to the mental health delivery system in East
Baton Rouge Parish and whether the proposed plan – should the mental health tax pass – adequately addresses
the existing issues.

The Committee has identified five specific areas as problematic with the potential tax revenues exclusively
funding the so-called Bridge Center:

• The choice of provider; and
• Whether the focus of the Center is healthcare or law enforcement; and
• Whether public monies are being diverted for private interests; and
• The lack of racial and clinical diversity in the Center’s leadership and decision-makers; and
• The lack of transparency and specificity associated with the proposed plan.

The report recommends that the mental health tax, if passed, would be most effective and inclusive if managed
by the local government entity designated by law to provide comprehensive behavioral health and substance
abuse services: the Capital Area Human Services District.

One of the driving goals for this tax proposal was to develop tools to alleviate the ongoing mental health
practices that have resulted in deaths of individuals in police custody at the East Baton Rouge Parish Prison. The
nonprofit organization Promise of Justice Initiative published two earlier reports on the ongoing crisis in the East
Baton Rouge Parish Prison, which includes over 25 deaths between 2012 – 2016. As of November 2018, prison
deaths in the facility persists and the Parish is involved in several active lawsuits, including the case of Jonathan
Fano, a local man who was arrested on October 31, 2018 by East Baton Rouge Police and who reportedly
suffered from mental illness. Fano was cited with six misdemeanors: obscenity, criminal trespass, disturbing
the peace, resisting arrest, misdemeanor battery on an officer, and simple criminal damage to property. He was
taken to the Parish Prison where he spent the 94 days – 92 of them in solitary confinement. Capital Area Human
Services District has been instrumental in providing psychiatric services to the prison and in providing training to
law enforcement on crisis intervention team (CIT) training.

The report points out that Capital Area Human Services is currently providing the most comprehensive wrap
around programming locally that focuses on a strategic plan inclusive of screenings, detention, and early
treatment. As the agency that started and managed the Mental Health Emergency Room Extension (MHERE),
the report continues, there would be no unnecessary and costly learning curve for that agency to take the lead on
these services going forward – not the proposed so-called Bridge Center.

For the full report, download it here.