Virginia GOP lawmakers Thursday rolled out three reform measures they say would strengthen the commonwealth’s mental health system as part of their push to overhaul how patients are screened and treated in the wake of the Virginia Tech massacre.
The plan would mandate a representative of the Community Services Board, the local agencies that provide community mental health and mental retardation services, to be present at all commitment hearings.
Recommended Stories
The package, to be introduced in the 2008 General Assembly session, would also streamline standards for involuntary commitment and increase the number of short-term psychiatric-care centers called “crisis stabilization units,” according to the legislature’s Republican leadership.
“The entire system is being reviewed,” said Del. Phil Hamilton, R-Newport News, who chairs the House Health, Welfare and Institutions Committee. “These are three [measures] that at this point in time we feel very comfortable about making a commitment to.”
Gov. Tim Kaine, a Democrat, is also likely to introduce mental health reforms.
The first round of proposals follows the release of an independent review of the April 16 tragedy at Virginia Tech, in which mentally ill gunman Seung-Hui Cho killed student students and faculty before taking his own life.
The panel, chaired by former Virginia State Police Superintendent Gerald Massengill, criticized what it called an “absence of oversight for Cho’s outpatient treatment.”
Kaine spokesman Kevin Hall said the Republican proposals “appear to track closely with what the Virginia Tech review panel recommended.”
“The governor has his own team looking at ways we can implement many of those ideas,” he said. “We would look forward to working with the legislature to tackle some of these issues.”
Expanding mental health services in Virginia, however, could run afoul of a projected $600 million budget crunch next year. Hamilton said Republicans do not have cost estimates for most of the proposal but said each crisis stabilization unit will cost about $1 million.
“We feel comfortable we can address these three areas within the financial constraints that we may have to face when we get here in January,” Hamilton said. “It’ll be about looking at existing expenditures, determining priorities.”
