Sunday May 3rd, 9:00 AM – 1:00 PM

Cover The Uninsured – free health screening and information!

Blood pressure screening, body mass index screening, vision tests / eye exams, foot exams, talking with a doctor, FREE hair cuts!

All are available while supplies last.

EVERYONE IS WELCOME

O’ Bryant Square – SW 9th and SW Washington in downtown Portland, within TriMet’s Fareless Square

More information at Cover The Uninsured. This service is provided by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

Brian Lindstrom’s acclaimed documentary Finding Normal is now available for sale on DVD.

See – www.findingnormal.org

Finding Normal is a feature-length cinema-verite documentary film about long-time heroin and crack addicts trying to rebuild lives devastated by addiction and incarceration.

The film follows two men and one woman leaving a detoxification treatment center in Portland Oregon, and entering Central City Concern’s Recovery Mentor program, which provides clean and sober housing, drug treatment, and – perhaps most importantly – a recovery mentor who knows first-hand what it takes to stay clean, stay out of prison, and build a “normal” life.

The film witnesses the day-to-day challenges of recovery, the heart-break of relapse, and the simple victories of a “normal” life: singing in a church choir, going fishing, watching a daughter graduate from high school.

Opinion published in the Salem Statesman Journal on April 27 2009 by Gina Nikkel, Ph.D., who the executive director of the Association of Oregon Community Mental Health Programs. These agencies are immediately and directly affected by the Governor’s proposed budget cuts to mental health services.

The Community Mental Health Programs (CMHPs) are the primary safety net for the most seriously mentally ill and addicted in Oregon.

These programs have been consistently underfunded for many years and, in spite of criticism, they are there day after day, providing services to very high risk people.

It has been the CMHPs that have absorbed the costs of the cuts of 1,000 front line mental health workers and 1,000 addiction front line workers in the budget cuts of 2002-03. Oregon’s mental health and addictions system faces staggering cuts again in 2009; elimination of mental health crisis response, elimination of acute psychiatric care, elimination of non-Medicaid outpatient mental health care, elimination of addiction treatment, etc.

If these cuts are taken, we will face a cycle of spending even more tax dollars inappropriately in emergency rooms, jails and prisons for our most vulnerable neighbors, only this time our law enforcement, courts and corrections systems are facing similar budget cuts.

At a time when dangerous criminals wait months for a trial, cycling in and out of jails too full to hold them, when the sick and injured sit for hours in the emergency room waiting to be seen, the last thing we ought to do is burden jails and hospitals with people whose severe mental health and addictions needs they were not designed or funded to serve.

People with the disease of serious mental illness and addiction should be cared for at the most appropriate, most cost effective levels of care in the community rather than defaulting to the most expensive institutional (or worse) settings.

Oregon has implemented world class innovations such as the Children’s System Change Initiative which is serving more children in less expensive ways than ever before; the Early Psychosis Intervention programs that diagnose and help young people manage serious mental illness before its allowed to disable them; Addictions Treatment for Moms and Dads, helping parents overcome their addictions and reclaim their children from the foster care system; the Strengthening Families prevention curriculum which helps high-risk teens and their parents learn to communicate and set boundaries; and other system-wide Evidence Based Practices.

Let’s not lose heart and go backwards.

Editorial by Stephen Kliewer, from the Wallowa County Chieftain, April 23 2009

The state of Oregon has stated that it is going to cut 30 percent of the funding for addictions and mental health this coming year. An ugly number considering such services are already underfunded and there is a rising demand for services.

But the real story is even worse. That 30 percent cut includes the total elimination of non-Medicaid community mental health services to adults and seniors. It includes a 100 percent cut of substance abuse treatment services to adults and seniors. It includes a 100 percent cut to crisis services, meaning that there would be no mental health hotline for suicidal people, or people with a severe mental health crisis. Those people would have to call law enforcement, or the emergency room. But there would be no funded mental health support for the ER staff. It includes a 100 percent cut to addictions prevention. A small amount of funding remains for high needs children, but that is all that is left.

Some in Salem argue that these lost services will be made up in the expansion of OHP standard membership. There are dangerous flaws in this reasoning. It may be over a year before people can actually get enrolled. During the six to 18 months before any of the people who lose care will be enrolled and able to access Medicaid services, uninsured people with severe mental illness and addictions will have no recourse besides emergency rooms, jails, and the streets.

Many of the people who currently rely on non-Medicaid services, the “sliding fee scale,” will never be eligible for OHP. These include military veterans who live too far from a VA facility to access care but too close to be exempted to see non-VA providers, Medicare beneficiaries whose needs for rehabilitative services are not covered, and the remaining uninsured and underinsured.

The funding that is being cut provides for adult and seniors mental health, crisis services and alcohol and drug services.

This money helps support psychiatric services, therapy, case management, nursing care, and a variety other services that provide stability for people with mental illness. If we do not have a system that provides these services we will pay for it in a cost shift to emergency rooms, law enforcement, courts, jails, prisons and the state hospital.

What do these cuts mean for Wallowa County? Let’s start by looking purely at dollars. Not counting the prevention dollars, which go to Wallowa Valley Together Project, Wallowa Valley Center for Wellness currently receives around $212,000 a year into the county to provide non-Medicaid services. The current budget being put forth at this time cuts $183,400, or 86.5%, of that amount. The OHP increase, when it begins to be felt 6-18 months after services are eliminated on July 1st, would at best replace only around $46,000 of those funds, a cut that still is around 65%. This represents at least 2 full-time clinicians from a system that is already stretched thin by need. Thus it is not merely the loss of services to those without insurance that is at stake, it is the ability of community-based health programs across the state to maintain the level of staffing needed to meet the needs of all people with mental health and addictions issues, including those with insurance. These cuts would effectively decimate the community-based mental health system for everyone.

What is tragic is that for the past ten years the state has been developing a system of care based on a healthy community-based mental health system. They have moved people into the community from residential programs. They have encouraged the development of drop-in centers such as Wallowa’s Riverside Center. They have moved people from hospitals to homes such as Wallowa River House, putting more and more of the responsibility on the local programs. And now they propose to cut the funding that allows stable programs to exist. Even the state admits that it will have to suspend the Oregon Administrative Rules (OARs) if they do this because the providers who survive the cuts will not be able to do what the state has mandated they accomplish. Even if funding returns several years down the road, the provider system in many communities will have disappeared. Key personnel will have been lost and the system may never recover.

Meanwhile, back in Salem, the bureaucracy that has been developed to oversee these endangered programs, cuts are also being made. But let us look at those cuts. They are taking a 4% cut in the personnel salary line, and a 2% cut in supplies. To me this is astonishing, perhaps even immoral. While the local programs, which actually provide the services to people in the local community, are being cut between 65% and 86.5%, the people sitting in cubicles who supposedly oversee these programs get cut 4%.

This does not make sense to me. I doubt it if will make sense to the person who cannot get out of bed and to work because of severe depression. Or to the wife whose husband is suffering from alcoholism, but does not have a local treatment program available. I doubt if it will make sense to the person who is suicidal, and in desperation calls the crisis phone, but finds that there is no one on the other end of the line to help them stay alive. Something is wrong with this equation.

I believe that these cuts, if implemented as proposed, will do two things. It will mean that the cubicles in Salem stay filled with bodies, while around half of the clinical offices in Wallowa County will stand empty.

It will mean that someone will continue to commute to work and push papers related to programs that no longer exist (who has to oversee OARs that are suspended?), while somewhere in Oregon, perhaps somewhere in Wallowa County, a suicidal person will die; a family will be torn apart by alcoholism; a youth will start drinking early and heavily, a severely mentally ill person without support will end up first on the street, and then in jail.

If you think the way these cuts are currently structured makes sense, then do nothing. If you think they don’t make sense, then contact Senator Nelson (503-986-1729, sen.davidnelson@state.or.us) or Representative Smith (503-986-1457 or rep.gregsmith@state.or.us) Demand that the necessary cuts be spread equally across the whole system, not taken out of direct services for the sake of administrative overburden. You may also testify to the Ways and Means Hearings. The closest hearing is Saturday, April 25 at the Pendleton Oregon National Guard Armory, 2100 N.W. 56th Drive 10 a.m. to noon. Representative Smith will hold a Townhall in Enterprise on May 2nd at 10am at Community Connections.

Tuesday, April 28 Governor’s Council on Alcohol and Drug Abuse Programs

9:30 am – 3:30 PM, 500 Summer St. NE, Room 137, Salem

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Wednesday, April 29, 7:00 – 8:00 PM

Judge Richard Baldwin & Heidi Grant, PsyD. talk about the Mental Health Court of Multnomah County, what it does and how it operates.

Providence Hospital, 4805 NE Glisan, Social Room

The meeting is free and open to the public.

The Mental Health Court provides support and resources for people who are on probation and suffer from a diagnosed mental illness and/or substance abuse.

From the Longview Daily News, April 19 2009

Heroin addiction is shooting upward in Southwest Washington – and so are heroin overdoses. Emergency Department personnel at St. John Medical Center have seen “a definite steady and noticeable increase” in heroin cases, said spokesman Randy Querin.

Police reports show officers frequently coming in contact with heroin users in the past several months, including a prostitute who said she turned tricks to support her habit, a woman who said she used heroin to take the edge off her cravings for meth and a man twice found turning blue from heroin overdoses on different bathroom floors four days apart.

Wednesday, the Cowlitz-Wahkiakum Narcotics Task Force arrested 11 suspected heroin dealers in connection with an investigation that began in November. Agents seized nearly a kilo – about two pounds – of heroin during the investigation, said Sgt. Kevin Tate of the Task Force.

Drug culture changing

“There’s a fundamental difference in the illegal drug culture of Cowlitz County than two years ago,” Tate said. “Addicts are increasingly relying on opiates as their drug of choice, and frequently their drug of choice is heroin.”

Shawn Strock, 23, a former Cowlitz County resident living in Portland, is in recovery for heroin addiction and makes daily visits to a Vancouver methadone clinic.

He said he began using heroin when he was 20 (the average age for a first-time user, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control). His addiction to narcotic painkillers began at age 15 and included OxyContin, Roxicodone, Fentanyl and morphine.

He and other addicts told The Daily News they switched to heroin because of the high cost of pills.

“Pills are so expensive,” Strock said. “Oxy 80 (an 80mg OxyContin pill) is going for 70 bucks now, but you can get a balloon (about .3 gram) of heroin for $20. Oxy 80 lasts 4 hours, but a balloon of heroin, when you first start out, will last you all day.”

Economic downturn not related to drug choice

But don’t jump to the conclusion that the current economic downturn has anything to do with an addict’s drug choice, Tate said.

“This shift is what we have been preaching about for years now – it is not surprising, shocking or due to the economy,” he said.

In 2006, local and federal narcotics agents made a dramatic roundup of 26 people illegally selling prescription painkillers, which brought the public’s attention to pill abuse by children and teens.

Tate said the investigation also educated narcotics agents about introductory addictive behavior, and the task force’s latest heroin investigation is a natural continuation of the pill investigation.

“Many of the baby addicts are adolescent addicts now addicted not to pills, but to a general class of opiates,” Tate said. “What we’re seeing is that the ‘gateway process’ is accelerated. The window from never using to heroin addiction used to take quite a while, with many opportunities to get out. Now it’s concentrated, going from no drug problem to addicted in a short time span.”

Kids as young as 13 using heroin

Strock said he’s seen kids as young as 13 using heroin – and addicts as old as 75 or 80.

Querin said St. John Emergency Department staff have noticed an increase in heroin use from teens to middle age.

Tate said it distresses him personally to see some young people he knew as babies have become heroin addicts.

“We’re seeing 14, 15, 16-year-old kids addicted to opiates. When we see that 17-year-old high school junior or senior that suddenly OD’d, that’s impactful.”

Heroin withdrawal is like a severe case of the flu, Tate said. The stronger the addiction, the more severe the reaction.

Symptoms include cramping, diarrhea, chills and nausea, and can last as long as a week.

Addiction pushes users to crime

“When you know you’re going to get the worst flu ever, your fear level goes up, and you’ll do anything to avoid having that feeling,” Tate said. This includes stealing from loved ones to get money for more heroin, he said.

“There’s an increased focus on self,” he said. “Lying and deception become easier.”

Addiction makes it easy for heroin users to justify committing burglaries, thefts, robberies, prostitution and other things they’d never have considered before taking dope, he said.

Some heroin addicts point to tighter restrictions on prescription drugs after the 2006 raid as the reason they switched from pills.

“I’ve had a couple flat-out say, ‘I was pushed to heroin because I couldn’t get pills,’ ” Tate said. “I think that’s a bunch of crap. They’re using because they chose to use. Addiction or not, it’s still a choice.”

Former Task Force agent Paul Carlson, who worked on the pill investigation, said many of the major pill dealers were already using heroin before the arrests.

“I don’t think (the raid) made the problem worse,” Carlson said. “If you’re addicted to Oxy, for full-fledged addicts it’s not much different than heroin.”

He said the raid had a positive effect on the community because it scared customers on the fringe of the drug world, many of whom were teens, into quitting.

“I think there was a huge impact on the pill population, the ones that weren’t dealing,” he said. “They saw the wide roundup and that freaked them out.”

Steady climb in heroin overdoses

At St. John Medical Center, Emergency Department workers code overdose patients either “poisoning/heroin” or “unspecified opioid type dependence,” but the opioid is most likely heroin, said PeaceHealth spokesman Randy Querin. He said there’s been a steady climb in opioid/heroin cases at St. John since 2007, from 128 in the first half of 2007 to 259 in the last half of 2008 (see table).

Overdoses are “more common than you realize, but most people don’t die,” said Carlson, who said he responded to a lot of overdose calls when he was a Longview patrol officer. “If it wasn’t for Narcan we’d have a ton of deaths.”

Narcan (naloxone) is an antidote that neutralizes the effects of opiates in a minute or less, depending on how much heroin the person has taken.

Mike Turner, a paramedic/firefighter with Cowlitz 2 Fire & Rescue since 1986, said paramedics don’t keep track of overdose numbers, but he injected Narcan in about 15 overdose patients in the last year.

“I wish there was a way we could videotape these people before we intervene,” he said. “They’re essentially dead. They’re not breathing. There’s barely a heart rate. Then they wake up, and they’re mad and deny using drugs. Sometimes there’s a needle still in their arm, but they’re always in denial. They think we’re stupid. We’re not the cops. We don’t need to be lied to. We just saved their lives, for crying out loud.”

As for fatal overdoses, Coroner Tim Davidson said his office documented 21 drug deaths in 2008. One was definitely heroin and the rest were fatal mixtures of drugs, he said.

He’s awaiting toxicology results on suspected drug overdose deaths from this year.

Sgt. Tate of the Task Force offered these theories for the increase in heroin overdoses, fatal and nonfatal:

The user is new to the drug and doesn’t know how much to take.

The user is changing the method of taking the drug from smoking to injecting, but is not changing the amount taken.

The source of the user’s drug supply fluctuates, and therefore so does the purity level, but the user can’t tell the purity by looking. Higher purity means the drug has not been diluted as much with other substances and is therefore more potent.

The user mixes heroin with other drugs without realizing how they interact chemically. The user also might inadvertently double-dose by taking a time-release opiate such as OxyContin and later taking heroin, not realizing the other opiate is still in the system.

How to tell if someone is a heroin addict

Heroin addicts don’t stand out like meth addicts do, but here are a few clues suggested by police and heroin users:

Immediately after taking heroin, a user goes “on the nod” – lethargic, incredibly sleepy, unable to function.

For the majority of the high, the user is very upbeat and seems normal.

Because the high wears off in four to six hours, look for recurring “flu” (withdrawal) that seems to disappear quickly (because the user takes another fix). The average heroin user is in withdrawal about half the time.

* Abrupt mood swings.
* Pinpoint-sized pupils.
* Stealing and other crimes.

Several heroin addicts in recovery told The Daily News they’d like to see a methadone clinic in Cowlitz County similar to the two clinics in Vancouver. All said those clinics serve a large number of Cowlitz County patients.

Methadone is a synthetic narcotic designed to help wean addicts off heroin. Taken orally once a day, methadone suppresses narcotic withdrawal. It’s only available in clinics. Its critics point out that methadone is also addictive.

A newer drug, Suboxone, also treats opiate dependence and is considered to have a lower potential for abuse than methadone, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. One of its ingredients is naloxone, also used in Narcan. Suboxone requires a doctor’s prescription.

Tate said enforcement, education/prevention and treatment all are equally important. He’d like to see longer sentences given to dealers. Ninety-seven percent of people arrested by the task force are found guilty or plead guilty, he said.

“I think treatment is fantastic, but if we put them back in our community they’re going to stay in our community and they’re going to do what they know how to do: Deal drugs.”

He said law enforcement and community leaders have talked for years about the necessity for a balanced approach to drug treatment and interdiction.

“Show me a program that works,” he said. “We (law enforcement) saw people dying. We have tools to stop people from dying – and make an opening for treatment programs to do their part. I would love to see every one of those heroin addicts in treatment and clean.”

EXTRA – The straight dope on heroin, Longview Daily News

From Willamette Week, April 22 2009

Local mental health and addiction services and state prisons aren’t the only potential budget cuts that could make life more brutish in Portland.

The potential loss of several key programs at the state Department of Human Services is truly sobering.

Following is a list of six programs that would be lost from DHS’ addictions and mental health division in a worst-case, 30-percent-cut scenario:

• Eliminating acute inpatient psychiatric care for nearly 6,000 adults.

• Eliminating 24-hour psychiatric community crisis services. About 15,200 use these services each year.

• Eliminating adult outpatient mental health services for 2,925 adults per year who are not eligible for Medicaid.

• Eliminating alcohol and drug prevention programs for more than
1,500 families per biennium.

• Eliminating problem gambling prevention and treatment that 3,700 clients access every year.

Multnomah County Forum to Save Our Human Services

Tuesday, April 28th, 4:30-7 PM

501 SE Hawthorne, Multnomah County Building, first floor boardroom

This location is accessible for people with disabilities.

Overview of the crisis we face

• Impartial informational presentation on the proposed cuts in Chair Wheeler’s Executive Budget.

Advocacy strategies to save our services

• Actions we can take to minimize these cuts and protect our most vulnerable citizens.

Accessible by Tri-Met bus lines #4, 6, 10, 14, 33
Street parking available. Parking garage across street locked up at 6 PM

Portland film maker Brian Lindstrom visits with enthusiastic movie-goers after the screening of his documentary

From the Oregonian editorial board member Doug Bates, April 22 2009

If you’ve never seen “Finding Normal,” the critically acclaimed documentary by Portland film maker Brian Lindstrom, I highly recommend you check it out.

And only if you’ve seen it will you fully appreciate the little story Lindstrom shared with me recently. It’s just a little slice-of-life vignette, but it illustrates a powerful ripple effect generated by arts funding — something that’s very much on the chopping block during this down economy.

Also on the chopping block, especially here in shortsighted Oregon, is state funding for drug and alcohol treatment. There’s a surprising nexus between the two subjects, as Lindstrom makes clear in the note he sent my way:

I had a chance meeting last week that hit home to me the importance of funding both arts agencies and residential drug treatment programs. I was in Old Town on my way to a planning meeting at the Community Engagement Program where I’m doing a Regional Arts & Culture Council (RACC)-funded film project that has me working with “dual diagnosis” folks (people with drug addiction AND mental illness) to guide them through the process of making a film about their experiences. I bumped into Dan Winters, who was profiled in “Finding Normal” (he was the white crack addict). Dan has more than 3 years clean, and is getting married April 24. He will soon begin a new job connecting Recovery Mentor Program graduates with jobs and housing.
Dan was handpicked for this job by Ed Blackburn, executive director of Central City Concern, who got to know Dan at Q and As following screenings of “Finding Normal” at Cinema 21, Living Room Theaters, Hollywood Theater, City Hall, Portland Development Commission, etc., and was very impressed with the way Dan handled himself.
Without a grant from RACC I wouldn’t have been able to make “Finding Normal.” Without “Finding Normal,” Ed wouldn’t have gotten to see Dan in action, and all the people who attended screenings wouldn’t have had a chance to see the person behind the label “addict.” And without the Recovery Mentor Program … you get the idea.
I think this chain of events is notable and demonstrates the far reach of art and the necessity of funding arts agencies and residential drug treatment centers.

I couldn’t have said it better. Thanks for shining a light on this ripple effect, Brian. Meanwhile, readers can check out Shawn Levy’s review of “Finding Normal” here.

– Doug Bates, associate editor; dougbates@news.oregonian.com

EXTRA – Buy a DVD of Finding Normal at www.findingnormal.org

The Mental Health Association of Portland will host four house parties raising money to help finish our film, ALIEN BOY in the next few weeks.

April 29 in SW Portland
May 7 in NE Portland
May 26 in NE Portland
June TBA in SE Portland

All fundraisers begin at 6 PM. Pick your date and send an email to Eva to RSVP for the party you plan to attend.

ALIEN BOY is a documentary film about the life and death of James Chasse.

At the house party you’ll meet ALIEN BOY filmmaker Brian Lindstrom and hear an update about the progress of the film. It’s all good news – the pieces are coming together! We’ll also show a new trailer for ALIEN BOY.

Opinion / Editorial from the Tri-City Herald, April 17 2009

For an agency with such an important mission, Greater Columbia Behavioral Health is kind of a mess.

First, the board of directors abruptly stopped the hiring process for a new executive director last month. It turns out that all five applicants were connected to the agency.

Board members rightly worried about the potential for conflicts of interest and wondered whether a search that attracted only insiders was broad enough to reach the best prospects.

So even though the agency was down to the final phase of hiring, the board launched a new search to widen the pool of candidates. The interim executive director will remain in place until further notice.

That was in March.

In April, the board voted to reconsider the makeup of its membership. It currently is composed of county commissioners and behavioral health providers from 11 counties in Eastern Washington.

County commissioners can appoint alternates to serve in their place on the board, which directs the course of the state-funded network.

Many of those alternates turn out to work for mental health agencies that have a financial stake in the board’s decisions.

No matter how well intentioned the participants are today, the potential for abuse under such a lax system raises a huge red flag. The board oversees a $59 million annual budget.

Benton County commissioners are leading the charge to change the composition of the board.

The revised board proposal would require that all Greater Columbia board members be county commissioners, even if they are serving in the role of alternates. No providers would be allowed.

A 7-4 vote has sent the measure back to each of the counties for a vote.

Benton County Commissioner Max Benitz says that having care providers on the board challenges its integrity, whether the potential conflicts of interest are real or only perceived.

Benton County commissioners feel so strongly about the issue that they might pull the county out of the agency altogether if changes aren’t made.

That could inflict serious damage on the altered agency, since its funding is based on population. Benton County is the largest in the network and could contract directly with the state for behavioral health funding.

A report from a Portland consulting firm backs up Benitz’s concerns, advising that no board member, alternate or staff member in a regional support network represent a provider receiving more than 5 percent of the funding.

Including stakeholders who are in the trenches doing the diligent work of mental health care on the board makes some sense. They understand the needs in our region.

County commissioners, on the other hand, are further removed from the work and less attuned to the issues.

But commissioners also are used to being briefed on challenging topics and making financial decisions in the best interest of the public. That is, after all, their job.

One potential solution could be to have an advisory board made up of providers. They wouldn’t make funding decisions, but they could function as a source of expert guidance to the commissioners.

We agree with the Benton County commissioners that it’s a sticky situation to have providers on the board. Real or imagined, it creates a cloud over the agency’s good work.

And given the delays in finding a new executive director, it seems like a good time to make the move.

EXTRA – Map of Greater Columbia Behavioral Health’s services in SE Washington.

OUR COMMENT – It’s important for our community to track mental health agencies from neighboring communities because of the long history of these agencies migrating difficult patients to Portland and Salem.

Medicaid Advisory Committee Public Meeting – Wednesday, April 22, 9:00 AM – 12:00 PM

Oregon State Library, Room 103
250 Winter St. NE, Salem

Dr. David Pollack from Oregon Health & Science University will give a presentation on best practices, considerations, and recommendations for physical and behavioral health integration. The Committee will also hear testimony from a panel of behavioral health consumer advocates on the accessibility of physical health care. The meeting will conclude with a legislative update.

Please submit written testimony electronically to Nicole Merrithew at Nicole.Merrithew@state.or.us.

Please visit the Committee’s website at www.oregon.gov/OHPPR/MAC/MACwelcomepage.shtml for minutes, reports and updates.

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Mental Health Caucus – Thursday, April 23rd

State Capitol, Hearing Room 343, Salem. Teleconference number: 503-378-3313

Rep. Ron Maurer, Chair 12:00 PM – 1:00 PM

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A Benefit Concert for David’s Harp featuring 12th Avenue Hot Club – Saturday, April 25, 2009, 7-9 p.m.

St. David of Wales Episcopal Church – 2800 SE Harrison St., Portland, Oregon

Suggested Donation $20. Donations are tax deductible

For information contact: David’s Harp 11261 NE Knott, Portland, OR, 503-253-8883 or Thomas Price at 503-816-6281 or email Thomas@price-price.com

The 12th Avenue Hot Club quintet plays a blend of ‘30s and ‘40s jazz known as Vintage Acoustic Swing: old classics and dusty jump tunes from the swing era made famous by Duke Ellington, Django Reinhardt and others.

David’s Harp is a program offering opportunities for independence and an improved quality of life for adults with mental illness celebrating its 30th year.

Opinion by Daniel Smith, published in the Salem Statesman Journal April 18 2009

Dr. Daniel Smith has spent 25 years working in community mental health, the past six as a forensic psychologist at Oregon State Hospital in Salem.

The governor’s special master, Judge James Hargreaves, reported that poor planning and a lack of urgency are at the heart of problems that continue to plague the Oregon State Hospital in Salem.

Hospital Superintendent Roy Orr points to significant progress in reaching accepted standards of care of the mentally ill.

Who is right in this glass half-full/half-empty debate? As a psychologist who evaluates mental-health consumers at the hospital, I don’t think either view is wrong. Yet each falls short of assessing the status of efforts to turn our state hospital into a modern mental-health treatment facility.

Efforts to recruit qualified staff, increase morale and modernize treatment have achieved some results. Administrators, nurses and physicians have been hired and old buildings are being refurbished, moved and razed in anticipation of a new facility in the aftermath of a scathing federal condemnation of hospital conditions.

These early steps tell me that if we fund clinically appropriate levels of direct-care staffing and services, Oregon can improve treatment of serious mental illness and give renewed hope to patients and their families. But that’s a big “if.”

One recent advance, the opening of cottages for residents preparing to return to their families, points up the need for good planning and preparation. Protocols were not complete when residents moved in, leading to problems. Other promising new transition programs have been rolled out before they were ready.

And even before the new central facility is complete, there are some warning signals.

Envisioning the best of all possible futures, the Oregon Department of Human Services set about to create a facility too small to meet the anticipated need with an eye toward compelling the state to revitalize and reinvent community mental-health programs throughout Oregon.

Then the economic crisis arrived. I know all about the downturn’s potential impact on services. I’m on the team negotiating a new state contract on behalf of 18,500 state workers represented by Service Employees International Union Local 503.

But coupled with a lack of public appreciation of the severe shortage of community mental-health care options, the budget crunch poses special threats for our new hospital, which could be understaffed and overcrowded from the day it opens.

We do not have to look far to see where that leads. Lack of community-based treatment has criminalized mental illness in Oregon. With few alternatives, localities treat the mentally ill through the criminal-justice system.

We have made some progress in de-stigmatizing mental illness and overcoming resistance to community group homes, but a lack of transitional housing continues to clog jails and send more individuals to the state hospital than we can properly treat.

These conditions contribute to a sense of frustration and futility in many residents and some respond violently, endangering themselves, their peers and the staff. And while reduced use of restraint and seclusion are notable reforms, they increase exposure of direct-care staffers to serious injury, accelerating a destructive cycle. Workers on paid medical leave exacerbate the staffing shortage, mandating overtime that increases cost of care and staff burnout.

READ – James Hargreaves’ report on the Oregon State Hospital

The Mental Health Action Group at First Unitarian Church of Portland invites all members of mental health advocacy / support / education community to our Spring Potluck.

Saturday, April 25 – 11:00 AM – 2:00 PM

First Unitarian Church of Portland
Buchan Building, Room B102
1011 SW 12th Avenue

Download the Spring Potluck flyer for details

If you cannot bring a dish, please come anyway! A half hour entertainment program at noon will include poetry and music. If you are bringing a potluck item, let us know. Also, if you would like to share a short (2 or 3 minute) creative piece (music, poetry, performance) let us know that, too! We are inviting members of several local mental health advocacy groups as well as our own members, so we can better know each other, honor the work we do, and have a nice time.

RSVP to Cathy Clemens at 503-267-5081 or email cathyclemens@msn.com

Oregon Attorney General John Kroger

Dear friends,

As Attorney General, I have no greater responsibility that to protect the civil rights and civil liberties of our citizens. Unfortunately, meeting this critical goal is currently very difficult. The Oregon Department of Justice used to have a civil rights enforcement unit, but back in the 1980s, the funding for this unit was eliminated. Today, as a result, I do not have a single attorney devoted to civil rights and civil liberties enforcement work. To me, that is unacceptable.

To fix this problem, I have proposed the re-creation of a Civil Rights Enforcement Unit at the Oregon Department of Justice. This unit will partner with our colleagues at the Bureau of Labor and Industries to prevent discrimination based on age, race, gender, disability or sexual orientation. We will also fight to protect important constitutional rights, promote environmental justice, preserve reproductive freedom, and defend the employment rights of Oregon’s veterans.

If you support reinvigorating civil rights enforcement in Oregon there are three things you can do to help:

1. Attend a public hearing (see schedule below). The Joint Committee on Ways and Means will be holding a series of public hearings in different communities in Oregon to take public input on state budget decisions. We want our supporters to demonstrate, in person, the importance of funding civil rights enforcement. If we can count on you to attend a public hearing near you, please respond to this email and let us know.

2. Contact your legislator and let them know that funding for civil rights enforcement is important to you. Passing both House Bill 5022 and Senate Bill 797 would allow for a small amount of seed money to start the civil rights enforcement unit and allow for it to eventually become partially self-funding.

3. Sign the online petition; forward this email to your friends and encourage them to take the action too!

I hope you that you value protecting our civil rights and civil liberties as much as I do. Together we can make tremendous positive change to the people of Oregon. I hope you will join me.

Sincerely,

John R. Kroger
Attorney General of Oregon

PUBLIC HEARING SCHEDULE

Monday, April 20 – Lincoln City
Lincoln City Cultural Center, 540 NE Hwy 101
5:30 to 8 PM

Tuesday, April 21 – Portland
Portland Community College -Cascade Campus, Auditorium, Moriarty Building, 705 N. Killingsworth Street
6 to 8:30 PM

Thursday, April 23 – Salem
Oregon State Capitol, 900 Court Street NE, Hearing Room F
5:30 to 8 PM
Including Hood River via video link

Saturday, April 25 – Pendleton
National Guard Armory, 2100 N.W. 56th Drive
10 AM to 12 PM

Saturday, April 25 – Ontario
Ontario Treasure Valley Community College, 650 College Boulevard
3 to 5 PM

Wednesday, April 29 – Bend
Central Oregon Community College, Cascades Hall Room 117
5:30 to 8 PM

Thursday, April 30 – Ashland
Southern Oregon University, Rogue River Room, Stevenson Union, 1250 Siskiyou Boulevard
5:30 to 8 PM

Friday, May 1 – Eugene
University of Oregon, Eugene, Prince Lucien Campbell Hall (PLC 180), 1415 Kincaid Street
1 to 4 PM