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April 26, 2006 MORE VETOES, AND NOW VETO OVERRIDES - $3.335M NOW PART OF STATE OPERATING BUDGET: Late last week, Governor Pataki issued additional vetoes of the budget agreement passed by the Legislature, targeting additional spending measures they wanted to include and a local property tax rebate the Legislature had included as well. Staying late on Monday night, their first night back after the Easter/Passover break, the NYS Assembly began overriding many of the vetoes that Governor Pataki had issued before the break. Early this afternoon, the NYS Senate began to follow suit, overriding nearly all of the Governor's vetoes, including ones the Governor claims were unconstitutionally altered by the Legislature and that he claims the Legislature has no authority to override. Some of the vetoes the Governor claims were unconstitutional include the extension of the Medicaid wrap-around for dual eligibles enrolled in Medicare Part D and the preservation of a physician's final determination about which medications are best for a Medicaid patient. For other measures that he vetoed, the Governor did not claim that they were unconstitutional, just that he objected to them on grounds related to the fiscal situation of the state. It appears that with the Senate's action today, the Legislature's restoration of $3.335 million in Local Assistance funding for community-based mental health providers will become law without legal challenges, and should take effect immediately. As of yesterday, and even early this morning, it appeared that overrides were not in the cards, primarily due to the NYS Senate Minority’s request that all information about Member Items (otherwise known as ‘pork’) be divulged in the budget. However, it appears that this impasse has been avoided with an agreement to disclose information about Member Items. TIMOTHY'S LAW SUPPORTERS RALLY IN BINGHAMTON: In an impressive showing of support, Timothy’s Law supporters came out to march through the streets of Binghamton on Friday and to rally in support of Timothy’s Law in front of the Binghamton State Office Building. Specifically, these residents were calling for the NYS Senate to pass Timothy’s Law (S.6735-a). This rally is the first in a series of events that will be taking place in localities throughout the state over the next month. Given the strong showing that this, first, event had, it seems likely that momentum behind Timothy’s Law will only grow stronger as these events take place and as the end of the Legislative Session in June draws near. Click here for information on upcoming Timothy's Law events SHU BILL REPORTED OUT OF SENATE COMMITTEE: On Tuesday, the Senate Crime Victims, Crime & Correction Committee moved to report S.2207 out of Committee and on to the Senate Committee on Finance. This legislation is aimed at eliminating the use of solitary confinement in prisons and jails for inmates living with psychiatric disabilities and calls for the creation of additional treatment options for such inmates. Senate sponsor, and Chair of this Committee, Michael Nozzolio expressed his support for the legislation as it was approved by his committee and noted the hard work of advocates in pushing for passage of this legislation. This marks the first time that this bill has advanced this far in the Senate and advocates are very empowered by this development and hope that this will provide enough momentum so that the bill will continue on its journey through the Senate Finance Committee and to the floor of the Senate for a vote before the Legislative Session ends in June. FORMER FIRST LADY ROSALYNN CARTER COMES TO ALBANY: On Monday, April 24th, the Foundation for Mental Health Advocacy sponsored an event featuring former first lady Rosalynn Carter. Mrs. Carter proved once again why she is one of the nation’s leading voices in the mental health movement. She gave a moving address about the stigma of mental illness and about mental health parity. In her remarks, she stated the importance of the passage of a parity bill in New York State. To paraphrase, she said that passage of a parity bill would send out the strongest possible message signal about the elimination of the stigma of mental illness. There was wonderful publicity about the event including a story in the Albany Times Union. In addition, it was the lead story in one of the local news station featuring the words of Mrs. Carter talking about parity and a follow up interview with Tom O’Clair discussing Timothy’s Law. Congratulations to the Foundation for running such a successful and empowering event. Even more symbolically than the event it self was the lasting words of both Mrs. Carter and Mrs. Cuomo as they spoke so passionately and eloquently about the broad issues of mental health and stigma. IN THE NEWS:
State
Assembly Overrides Governor's Budget Vetoes. By
Danny Hakim The New York State Assembly overrode more than half of Gov. George E. Pataki's 207 budget vetoes Monday night and rejected $650 million worth of Medicaid cuts, even though the governor has said he would ignore the move. The Assembly also rejected steep reductions in aid for state universities and tuition assistance programs. While it was not clear how the Republican-controlled Senate would respond, their leaders said they would probably also move forward with overrides unless a compromise is reached with the governor. Mr. Pataki's staff said on Sunday that the governor had offered a compromise days before to restore some of his cuts to Medicaid and the Legislature's tax-cut package. Legislative leaders were stunned by the assertion, saying that they had been made no such offer, making a deal appear unlikely. Mr. Pataki asserts that many of his vetoes, which cut $2.9 billion from the budget, cannot be overridden because the Legislature violated the state's Constitution in rewriting portions of his executive budget. He has also said state agencies would not carry out overrides if they are not constitutional. Overriding the governor's vetoes requires a two-thirds vote in the Assembly and the Senate. The Senate must move first to override the vetoes of many significant portions of the budget, including property tax cuts and child tax credits. Leaders of both the Assembly and Senate have rejected the governor's claim that their overrides are not constitutional, and say they are prepared to take the fight to court, though they have a poor track record against the governor in past battles over the budget powers. Still, a prolonged legal battle could place the budget, which Mr. Pataki signed at the beginning of the month, into legal limbo for the rest of Mr. Pataki's final year in office. That has caused the legislative leaders to begin counting the days until Mr. Pataki's departure. The usually stoic Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver appeared almost buoyant as he presided over a wave of overrides on Monday night. In comments on the floor, Assemblyman Herman D. Farrell Jr., the state Democratic Party chairman, said: "The governor threatens us by threatening to ignore any of our veto overrides. The people elected us to represent them and not be bullied by threats." Senate Majority Leader Joseph L. Bruno, in comments to reporters in Albany, called Mr. Pataki's budget cuts "unconscionable," adding that he was prepared "to go legal" against his fellow Republican. Mr. Pataki, speaking in Brooklyn to celebrate the signing of the education portion of the budget, including $11.2 billion in construction aid for New York City schools, cited his concern about keeping spending in check. "I know what I am doing is everything I can to try to leave New York in the best possible condition for whoever the next governor is," he said. Not all of his vetoes may be overridden. A top Senate Democrat, Liz Krueger, said her party members were not likely to go along with the Republican Senate leaders on restoring $350 million, for so-called member items, money for secretive pork-barrel projects that Mr. Pataki had stricken from the budget, unless the projects were disclosed and the Democrats given a proportional share of the money. "We're not interested in overriding the vetoes on the member items unless there's transparency in the process and equity," Ms. Krueger, a Manhattan Democrat, said. Wading into the budget fight on Monday, Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, a Democrat who is a candidate to replace Mr. Pataki, said he did not support eliminating a policy allowing couples to claim Medicaid benefits when one spouse refuses to pay the other's medical bills. The so-called spousal refusal policy has been widely criticized because of cases in which millionaires used it to collect Medicaid benefits. Mr. Pataki and Mr. Spitzer's chief Democratic rival, Nassau County Executive Thomas R. Suozzi, have supported eliminating or substantially revamping the policy. "There may be some flagrant abuses that need to be addressed, but the fact is that very few families have the resources to pay the cost of nursing home care on their own," Mr. Spitzer said in a speech in Albany on Monday. "Until we manage this problem, we need to develop a strategy that addresses the fundamental issues of long-term care." Mr. Suozzi, who has made Medicaid reform a theme of his campaign, said in an interview that Mr. Spitzer had "failed to make those flagrant abuses a priority for the past seven and a half years he's been in office." "This is less about spousal refusal than Eliot's refusal to take on Medicaid waste, fraud and abuse," he added. Members of Mr. Pataki's staff said they had had a compromise before the Legislature for some time and delivered it in writing on Monday. Legislative leaders said they have been rebuffed in efforts to negotiate with the governor. "The governor has been negotiating through the press," Mr. Bruno said, adding, "We've been trying to negotiate over this last week or 10 days but I've got to tell you we are, practically speaking, nowhere." Overrides
Underway. by Elizabeth Benjamin After much speechifying by Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno and Senate Minority Leader David Paterson, the Senate has begun overriding Gov. George Pataki’s budget vetoes. The first vote was 60-0. There are 62 senators, but since there were no “nay” votes, I’m assuming two people are missing. (Update: The two MIAs were both Democrats: Ruth Hassell-Thompson, who I’m told had surgery recently, and Jose Serrano Jr.). A number of vetoes were overridden, including $5.2 million to keep Camp Pharsalia open as a minimum security prison, rather than converting it to permanent sex offender housing, $500,000 to fund the Capital Defenders Office, which provides legal services to death row inmates, and $400,000 for the Defender’s Association. The Senate also voted to override Pataki’s veto of $8 million for Buffalo. On Camp Pharsalia, the Assembly in particular objected to Pataki’s plan to spend $130 million to keep 500 of the state’s worst sexual offenders deemed by experts to have a high likelihood of recidivism locked up indefinitely. Paterson said the agreement on making member items public is as follows: “when money leaves the door at any point, there will be disclosure within 30 days.” “We will now have an openness about items…that are paid for with the taxpayers’ money,” Paterson said. “This is the only way we can operate. This is the public’s money.” Bruno, in explaining why the Senate had decided to go ahead with the overrides and risk a long legal battle with Pataki, said: “We are certain the governor went above and beyond any authority that the courts ever intended…That calls for clairity, and that calls for litigating whether the Legislature in this state - all 212 elected officials - have any rights on behalf of the people in the budget process.” Laying
a stigma to rest - Rosalynn Carter visits Albany to raise money
to fight mental illness. By Dan Higgins Former first lady Rosalynn Carter came to Albany Monday to help raise money for a group dedicated to removing the stigma of mental illness. Carter, 79, was the guest of honor at a reception for The Foundation of Advocacy for Mental Health. The Albany-based group funds mental health education programs. And Carter has made that subject a top priority, beginning when her husband, Jimmy, became governor of Georgia in 1971 and through his presidency. She continues to work on the issue through The Carter Center's Mental Health Program, which was founded in 1991. Monday's reception was held at the Lincoln House on State Street. Health care for the mentally ill has improved dramatically in the last 35 years, Carter said, but still more must be done, especially where insurance coverage of mental illness is concerned. In the early 1970s, people with serious mental illnesses were often sedated and put into institutions. And having mental illness was a source of shame or embarrassment, she said. Thirty-five years later, doctors understand the brain so much better that many people with mental illnesses can lead normal lives. But the stigma of a mental disorder won't completely go away until health insurance covers mental ailments in the same way physical illness is covered, Carter said. To see that happen, "would be a dream come true," she said. "I'm not optimistic about it, but it would be wonderful." She urged the 200 or so people in attendance to lobby state legislators to pass a mental health parity law. In New York, the Assembly has passed what is known as Timothy's Law. That bill would require insurers to cover treatment for a wide range of mental health and substance abuse issues. The state Senate has not passed the legislation, and Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno opposes it. Bruno was at Monday's reception to greet Carter and pose for photographs. He had left before Carter made her comments about parity legislation. Carter appeared in Albany because of an invitation from an old friend. Matilda Cuomo, New York's former first lady, is on the Foundation of Advocacy's board of directors. At the reception Monday, Cuomo praised Carter for her decades of work on behalf of people with mental illness and human rights causes. Advocates
Push For Affordable Housing For Mentally Ill. by Cara
Matthews ALBANY - Advocates and lawmakers are pushing the state to set up a waiting list for mentally ill residents who need housing and develop at least 35,000 units for them within 10 years. Tens of thousands of state residents with serious psychiatric disabilities don't have access to affordable housing and their quality of life has suffered, members of a new coalition, the New York State Campaign for Mental Health Housing, said Monday. New York spends millions each year on services that don't help this population long term, they said, such as shelters, hospitals, adult homes and prisons. "We can't achieve any of the goals that all of us collectively need to accomplish unless we know what's out there, unless we know what the need is, unless we know what the cost is, and we won't know that unless we do enact this bill into law," said Senate Mental Health Committee Chairman Thomas Morahan, R-New City, Rockland County. Assembly Mental Health Chairman Peter Rivera, D-New York City, is sponsoring the legislation in his house. The groups estimate that New York has about 30,000 units of supportive-housing “meaning additional services are provided, such as crisis counseling and job training” and there is a need for some 70,000. About half the beds would be in New York City, said Toni Lasicki, executive director of the Association for Community Living. New York City recently received word it would get 5,550 more, she said, so that would leave a need for 14,450 more units there and 20,000 more elsewhere. A 2001 University of Pennsylvania study found that it would cost only $995 more a year to house homeless people with serious mental illness in New York City and provide them with services than to leave them homeless $40,499 compared with $41,494. When people have safe housing, they decrease their use of shelters, psychiatric institutions and other hospitals, and prisons, which are costly, the report said. The cost would be lower outside of New York City, and it could vary depending on the intensity of services needed and other factors, advocates noted. The initial investment would be $100 million a year. "Doing nothing basically is very expensive and it's a tremendous Medicaid cost to the counties because people are winding up in emergency hospitals waiting rooms and in psychiatric hospitals for one-month hospitalizations that then get repeated again," said Steve Coe, executive director of New York City-based Community Access, which provides housing and advocacy for people with psychiatric disabilities. The state has been a national leader in developing community housing for people with mental illness, said Jill Daniels, a spokeswoman for the state Office of Mental Health. The state has 27,500 beds with 3,600 more being developed. That does not include the additional 5,550 units for New York City, she said. In the past few years, the state has allocated $13 million for rent stipend increases, she said. |
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