The Economic Recession that began in 2001-2002 impacted many services in Colorado. Yesterday, we received a briefing on one of those areas - Services for the Mentally Ill.

In the past 4 years, we saw an increase in anti-psychotic pharmaceutical costs of 300% - at the same time, we saw a reduction in funding for our Mental Health Safety Net System of 33%.

We will get a clarification of the individual impact of these cuts from the Department at their hearing, but staff estimates the number of mentally ill in the state who are not receiving services currently just due to those cuts at 1,724 individuals.

While that number is remarkable and the thought of 1,724 mentally illl people who were receiving services in 2002 and are no longer receiving those services is very disturbing consider a report by the department of Human Services that evaluated the level of need in the state.

The Department evaluated the unmet need for mental health services in the state through 2004- they estimate a colorado population of 66,000 people (approximately the population of Longmont) with "serious mental illnesses" not receiving services. If we were to cover all of these individuals with services, it would cost over $200 Million - a ten fold increase over our current appropriated amount.

You can read this section of the report by Alexis Senger of the JBC Staff on page 71 of the briefing report found at:
Link

Tom Plant