Education + Advocacy + Action = CHANGE!
The Mental Health Association of Portland provides educational and advocacy opportunities for people with mental illness and addiction.
From the classroom to the courtroom, from the statehouse to the bedside, supporters of the Association educate the community and advocate for improvements in the public health system, the criminal justice system, the public housing system, and the path between – the mental health system.
The Association supports four enduring projects; the Law & Mental Health Conference, the Alternative Mobile Services Association, and the Mental Health Alliance, and the Public Housing Conference. The Association is a member of or in alliance with several organizations, including the Albina Ministerial Alliance for Justice and Police Reform, the Oregon Council on Behavioral Health, the Disability Rights Oregon, the Oregon Justice Resource Center, the Homeless Alcohol and Drug Intervention Network, The Policing Project of New York University Law School, and the Center for Innovations in Community Safety at Georgetown Law School.
The Association is peer-led, independent and impartial. It is not a government contractor, and receives no contract funding from governments. The Association maintains a large advisory council of both peers and professionals who are community leaders or subject matter experts.
Legacy et al v Hathi
On December 6 2024, the Mental Health Association of Portland filed a motion in the District Court to intervene in Legacy et al v Hathi.
The organization represents the interests and welfare of people with mental illness and addiction, and provides consultation and professional education for providers of service. It has a keen interest in the welfare of people with mental illness and addiction, shown by years of dedicated community work.
The parties to Legacy et al v Hathi represent their unique and complex financial interests. Both provide essential vital services for individuals associated with the organization, and tens of thousands of other Oregonians with mental illness and addiction. They are the bedrock and exemplar of service, and we depend on their abilities with our lives.
At odds are the rights and needs of persons with mental illness who are committed to the care of the state through civil commitment. At this point, for the most part, what’s available to those persons is short-term stay hospitalization. This is not a best practice, or an acceptable practice, when resources and facilities are available for both long-term hospitalization, and, importantly, a myriad of alternatives to hospitalization. Those remedies, if made effective and available, could significantly reduce the need for hospitalization and civil commitment in Oregon.
Patients, and their families, friends, neighbors, and employers, want alternatives to hospitalization. These alternative remedies include intensive home treatment, peer respite, secure residential treatment, outpatient restoration to competency, assisted outpatient treatment, alcohol and drug free housing, community psychiatric medicine and mobile crisis teams, better training for first responders, crisis stabilization centers, and step-down psychiatric facilities. Considering the impact of these alternative remedies in other states, their cost to implement is a fraction of continuing hospital-level of care.
Further, consideration of alternatives to hospitalization conforms with the mandates of the Olmstead Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act.
As an intervenor, the Mental Health Association of Portland intends to bring alternatives to hospitalization to the discussion of remedies to Legacy et al v Hathi. We’re happy to be represented by Juan Chavez of the Oregon Justice Resource Center, and Michael Fuller and Nate Haberman of The Underdog Lawyer.
MHAP motion to intervene – 12 6 2024
MHAP complaint in intervention – 12 6 2024
Learn More ~
Oregon Insane Hospital & the Lone Fir Cemetery
Recent Publishing by the Mental Health Association of Portland
Oxford House Hendrick – in Clark County, Washington
Media Guide: Your Language Matters When Writing About Mental Illness
Unity Center Archive – 2015-2018
Advisory Committee Member’s Bill of Rights – September 2022
Communicating with people who think differently – advice for members of the Portland Police Accountability Commission, November 2022
Portland Candidate Forum – August 2024
Funding for the Mental Health Association of Portland comes from Charles & Lynn Schusterman Family Philanthropies, and from the Microsoft Corporation.
