House GOP budget would impact mental health services for minorities

LANSING– A proposed budget plan introduced Tuesday by House Republicans would eliminate 15 percent of the funding provided to several minority groups in the greater Detroit area, which advocates say would result in higher medical costs for the state and reductions in income tax generated by job placement programs.

The proposed budget (pdf) recommends cutting $1,023,570 from the Michigan Department of Community Health’s Multicultural budget line item. The fund is used to fund mental health and disability assistance for a multitude of minority residents in greater Detroit.

Documents released by MDCH show the budget item includes two areas of funding. The first are direct grants to the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit, the Chaldean Community Foundation and the Inter-Tribal Council of Michigan.

Documents shows the grant to JFMD funds: case management; mental health counseling; psychiatric evaluations; transportation and translation services; programming for adults with developmental disabilities; medical advocacy; home visits; support services; services for Holocaust Survivors and their families; and summer programs for teens and children with disabilities.

The grant to CCF provides funding for a partnership with St. John Health System-Eastwood Clinics to provide mental health services for refugees. It also funds: outreach; health awareness; prevention and treatment strategies; case management; translation services; education; transportation; and mental health services and evaluations.

The grants to the Inter-Tribal Council of Michigan provide funds for mental health services “in an ethnic-sensitive manner,” to seven federally recognized tribes.

The second half of the program funding is provided to 14 Community Health Services Programs for mental health programs focused on Chinese, Native American, Asian, Hispanic, Arab/Chaldean and Vietnam Veteran clients.

Republican officials say that while these cuts are difficult, they have to be done.

“I have supported the multicultural line for years. If I had unlimited money I would give them more money. The problem is we just don’t have the money,” said state Rep. Chuck Moss (R-Birmingham). Moss is the ranking Republican on the House Appropriations Committee.

However, according to a report released by the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit, the combined spending of the Multicultural line item of $4,693,876 translates into a combined savings for the state of more than $20 million. It also, according to the report, generates an additional $2.8 million in income tax revenues. The program serves 12,000 people, according to Linda Blumberg, planning director of the JFMD.

The savings are counted by measuring the burden of forcing adults with disabilities — including mental health issues, dementia, disabilities and other medical conditions — into more institutional care programming, such as nursing homes. In addition, the savings include reduced hospitalization through medical case management which assists clients in adhering to medical care programs.

The income tax revenue is generated by programs that assist people with chronic mental illness to obtain and maintain employment. This lifts them off state assistance programs, reducing program payments, and shifts the clients into the taxpayer base.

Exactly how much the proposed 15 percent reduction in funding would impact those savings and tax revenues is unclear.

Moss was presented with these savings numbers several times and asked how the state was actually saving money by cutting the program, thus increasing the likelihood the taxpayers would see a back end burden on the budget. He declined to answer the question, saying only the state did not have the money.

Martin Manna, executive director of the Chaldean Community Foundation says the proposed cuts would seriously impact the services his group is providing to Iraqi Chaldeans who come to the Detroit area fleeing sectarian violence in their native Iraq. He said a complete elimination of the program would impact between 500 and 600 people, but is unsure what a partial reduction, as the GOP plan calls for, would do. He said his group has dealt with 9,000 immigrants this year and that the area is expected to receive another 10,000 to 20,000 refugees in the coming year, according to reports from the U.S. State Department.

MDCH spokesman James McCurtis says the department supports the program and will “push” for it.

“We would like to see it remain in the budget. It’s very important. We’re pushing for it,” McCurtis said. But McCurtis tempered his statements, noting that the state legislature is just beginning the process and will see many proposals in the coming weeks. “We just want to wait and see what the legislature decides.”

Judy Putnam, spokesperson for the Michigan League for Human Services, says the group opposes the cuts.

“We know that prevention works and that when you cut prevention programs, we pay more down the road,” Putnam said.” We have systematically targeted social and health issues where they are it, but now we are unraveling them.”

Putnam said the League characterized the budget proposal as “wrong.”

“The only balance in this budget proposal is balancing the budget on the backs of kids, the frail elderly, and the disabled,” Putnam said.