Concerns over the extension of Kendra's Law in the NYS Budget negotiations with Harvey Rosenthal transcript.

Host:  Welcome to Independent Perspective, a public affairs presentation of Western New York Independent Living (WNYIL). Our guest today is Harvey Rosenthal, Chief Executive Officer of the New York Association of Psychiatric Rehabilitation Services (NYAPRS). And I'm your host Ernie Churchwell. Welcome to the program Harvey.

Guest:   Hi Ernie, thanks for our having me.

Host:  It’s our pleasure. You're here because you're well informed about a concern about something going into the New York State budget which is supposed to be passed by April 1, and assistant outpatient treatment. And I believe you've got the full story on it and why it's such a concern.

Guest:  Yes. This really began with the passage of Kendra's Law in 1999. And the bill was passed, really out of a representation of people like us as violent and who needed to be coerced into outpatient voluntary outpatient treatment, I should say and so we really I'm with this, I'm the CEO of the NYAPRS and we have successfully fought to prevent Kendra's Law from being expanded or made permanent, and to focus instead, Ernie, on really voluntary, community based, you know, often peer lead approaches that are more effective and more ethical and, and even cost effective. So, what we're doing now is we have a whole list of, of alternatives that we're talking about. And we're using that really to make the case that there's no need for expansion, expand Kendra's Law, the governor's proposal would make it easier to basically keep people in an order even if they're months. They would essentially in my mind, be denied their due process rights, and be placed back on the order. So, we're very concerned about that particular piece in the governor's proposal.

Host:  It's my understanding that even as it stands, Kendra's Law allows somebody with relatively little connection to the individual involved to have them brought before a judge to determine if they need to be put into formal treatment. And that's just too casual of an authority to give to just any bystander wouldn’t you say?

Guest:  It's not really any bystander, but it is a broader number of people than we would like. In the end it turns out that the county directors are really the mental health directors are the ones that are mainly initiating it. I'm told that there's not as many petitions from family members and others than we might think. But in any event, I do think that people's behaviors being interpreted as a mental illness for which you know, a course of amount of treatment that needs to be provided is simply wrong. It's 2022. We know how to engage folks in all kinds of states on a voluntary basis. And we don't need laws that are pressured by rare tragic events, let's say in the city, in New York City recently, that lead to a call to go back in the day and start to expand forced outpatient treatment and Ernie there's even proposals to expand forced inpatient commitment.

Host:  Since this is a concern, that is going to occur within less than a month, what would you think that people that care about this should do to help individuals who could be affected?

Guest:  Well, the greatest thing you could do, I've been working on it all morning, is to come to Albany on March 10 for the NYAPRS Annual Legislative Day. It's going to be a very smaller version of it next Thursday, this coming Thursday. And we think we'll have cars and vans that are coming from the Western New York area. I think Restoration Society is helping to organize that or recovery options and WNYIL and I think we're should be getting cars and vans and buses on that day and I think people will be able to do, we'll do marches, we'll do a news conference. We'll speak to legislators but also Ernie, I've got materials that have been out that people can receive through email and can use that to advocate with their legislators.

Host:  Harvey, we're totally out of time and if people want more information how can they reach you?

Guest:  They can reach me at harveyr@nyaprs.org

Host:  Thanks so much for being with us Harvey.

Guest:  Ernie, thank you for having me. I want to send all the best to Maura Kelley; who I know whose brainchild all of this is.

Host:  Thanks so much. You've been listening to Independent Perspective, a public affairs presentation of WNYIL. Our guest today was Harvey Rosenthal, Chief Executive Officer of the New York Association for Psychiatric rehabilitation services. I've been your host Ernie Churchwell.