New York Governor Announces Plan To Evaluate Residents of State’s Facilities for Mentally Ill

New York Gov. George Pataki (R) has announced plans to evaluate 15,000 mentally ill residents of adult homes to determine whether they could be moved to "smaller, better-managed facilities" as part an "ambitious effort to overhaul" and eventually eliminate the state's adult-home system, the New York Times reports. The facilities have been considered "something of a dumping ground" for patients with mental illnesses who have been discharged from state psychiatric hospitals (Levy, New York Times, 12/13). A New York Times series in April reported on the "neglect, abuse and corruption" in New York's 176 adult homes that specialize in care for mentally ill residents. The Times examined 5,000 pages of annual state inspection records; 200 interviews with workers, residents and family members; and 36 visits to the homes over a one-year period. The Times found that the facilities have become "places of misery and neglect, just like the psychiatric institutions before them." In November, the Pataki administration issued a plan to address problems at some of the facilities. A legislative subcommittee that worked with the Pataki administration on the plan estimated that as many as half of the state's adult home residents could live independently with some support (Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, 11/26). The evaluation project is expected to last more than one year and cost "several million dollars," but the administration has not said how it will be funded, according to the Times. Karen Schimke, a member of Pataki's mental health care reform panel and president of the Schuyler Center for Analysis and Advocacy, said, "Without these assessments, reformers won't know what to do. The surest way to close down reform is to lack the information with which to carry it out" (New York Times, 12/13).