Congressman Steny Hoyer (D-Maryland) and Singer Judy Collins 

I attended the annual Remarkable Journeys gala last night, an annual fundraising event which benefits Green Door, a non-profit, community based mental health agency in our nation’s Capital.  Each year, Green Door provides care to more than 1,800 adults with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, severe depression and other mental illnesses. One of the reasons why I admire Green Door is because it not only offers psychiatric help, but also hope, through housing and supported employment programs, both of which I believe are essential to recovery.

I often am asked to speak at fund raisers and many of them are for fabulous agencies just like  Green Door. But the Remarkable Journeys gala is different. Why? Because this event brings together some of Washington’s powerful elite – each of whom seem to check their egos, their politics and their status at the door, and enter prepared to support the Green Door mission.  My friend Michele Oshman, a Green Door board member, invited me to my first Green Door gala a few years ago, and at that time she told me what a special event it was.  She convinced me to become a donor and we’ve been attending the event together ever since.

I’ve lived too long in the D.C. area to be star struck. That’s not why I am impressed by the many D.C. ‘movers and shakers’ I see at the Green Door gala each year. This gala reminds me that mental illnesses don’t discriminate. No one is immune, not even powerful attorneys, wealthy business leaders, members of Congress,  or journalists. I’ve also been around politicians enough to know that when they attend events like this, they stop in to make a quick speech, shake a few hands and head out the door.

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Why are there limited choices when it comes to mental health reform?

Last week, I published excerpts from Rep. Tim Murphy’s recent hearing entitled:  “Where Have All the Patients Gone? Examining the Psychiatric Bed Shortage.”  Experts at that hearing explained how a lack of crisis care beds has frustrated mental health workers and contributed to  jails and prisons becoming our new mental asylums.

The last excerpts that I published Saturday came from Arthur C. Evans Jr., the director of mental health services in Philadelphia who acknowledged the bed shortage but added this caveat:

“It is counterintuitive that the solution to a perceived inpatient bed shortage is to build a strong community-based service system. But, experience consistently shows this to be the case. An over emphasis on inpatient beds can drain needed resources away from the very services that prevent people from needing crisis services.”

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SHERIFF TOM DART’S TESTIMONY BEGINS AT 40:30

“The unfortunate and undeniable conclusion is that because of dramatic and sustained cuts in mental health funding, we have criminalized mental illness in this country and county jails and state prison facilities are where the majority of mental health care and treatment is administered. ” Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart.

Since taking charge of Chicago’s Cook County Jail in 2006, Sheriff Tom Dart has been a strong voice advocating for mental health services, as his poignant testimony before the Energy and Commerce Subcommittee showed.

TA has been arrested over 100 times. Her most recent arrest came about after she attempted to steal $20.00 from a person’s purse during a church service. TA is a chronic self-mutilator. She attacks her arms with her own finger nails or any object she can find. To keep her safe while in our custody, we made special mittens that went up to her armpits. Incredibly, she was sentenced to a Click to continue…

 
GUNTHER STERN’S FIVE MINUTE TESTIMONY BEINGS AT 54:31

“It is impossible to talk about people with severe, untreated, mental illness without talking about homelessness.”   Gunther Stern

I followed Gunther Stern for several days as he walked Georgetown streets helping homeless, often psychotic men and women, and I was deeply touched by his compassion. His testimony before the House Energy and Commerce subcommitte last week gave a human face to our failure to help individuals with mental disorders and co-occurring problems.

Greg was once a gifted constitutional lawyer who delighted his children with his dry wit. They were in their late teens when he began to show the signs of

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