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Advocacy: The Power of the Collective Voice
Policy-making can solve systemic problems, but we can only achieve true behavioral healthcare reform with adequate financial resources. Advocating for public support for mental healthcare takes time, persistence, and a group effort. One of the most successful examples of collaboration in New...
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Advocacy’s Strange Bedfellows: How New York’s Landmark Behavioral Health Budget Came to Be
Governor Hochul's Executive Budget for Fiscal Year 2023-2024 (FY 2024) included unprecedented investments in behavioral healthcare and related services for the most vulnerable residents of New York. This emerged in response to widespread homelessness, rapidly rising rates of suicide, and epidemics...
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A Call to Amend New York’s Constitution on Mental Health
For decades, New York has been a national leader in advancing mental health policy. Legislators, advocates, providers, and families have fought tirelessly to secure access to treatment, improve insurance coverage, and reduce the stigma surrounding mental illness. Yet despite these efforts, a...
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New York State Announces Statewide Enhancements to Improve Assisted Outpatient Treatment
Critical Investments from the FY 2026 Budget Standardize 'Enhanced Voluntary Agreements' with Recipients; Improving State Oversight State Also Completes Massive Data Modernization Enhancing Local Coordination and Improving Outcome Monitoring The New York State Office of Mental Health (OMH)...
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A Brief History of Peer Support and its “Integration” into Behavioral Healthcare: The Uneasiest of Bedfellows
The proliferation of peer services throughout the behavioral healthcare and social welfare systems has transformed them in ways their progenitors might not have anticipated. The peer support and recovery movements originated in eighteenth-century France under the auspices of Phillipe Pinel and...
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The Need for More Effective Approaches to Mental Health Crises
Law enforcement officers are most often the first responders when individuals are experiencing a mental health crisis. Some research studies have estimated that at least 20% of police service calls involve a mental health or substance use crisis, and this demand has been increasing for many...
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NY State Governor Hochul Receives National Award for Outstanding Leadership in Mental Health Policy
Mental Health America’s 2026 Governor’s Leadership Award Cites Administration’s ‘Significant and Sustained Investments’ in Mental Health Governor Hochul has Channeled Approximately $2 Billion into Expanding Access; Strengthening New York State’s Continuum of Care Governor...
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Severe, Long-Term Mental Illness: What Does it Take to Live Well?
Typical images of people with severe, long-term mental illnesses are misleading. We think not of people who, despite mental illness, have lives that they find satisfying and meaningful but of homeless people dressed in rags pushing shopping carts with all their belongings and sleeping on heating...
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Policy and Practice: A Discouraging Disconnect
As soon as I learned the summer edition of Behavioral Health News would address our efforts to meet the needs of vulnerable populations, I experienced a rather sudden and dispiriting thought. In so many ways we have failed to satisfactorily address the needs of our most vulnerable citizens despite...
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We Must Advocate for Older Adults with Behavioral Health Conditions
As of this writing, the healthcare and behavioral health systems are facing unprecedented threats from proposed legislation to significantly roll back the gains achieved through the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Medicaid is also under threat, as the current legislative proposal attempts to alter its...
