Mental Health Levy on November Ballot
But Jim, when somebody's in jail, they don't get treatment, but they're clean because they don't get drugs. – Skip Claypool
The Geauga County Board of Mental Health and Recovery Services is seeking a renewal of its current five-year, 0.7-mill levy.
Jim Adams, executive director of the board, came before Geauga County Commissioners May 23 to request approval to place the levy on the November ballot.
“This is the second time it’ll be up for a renewal, so by the time this comes around the third time, it’ll be 15 years at the same rate, the same collection,” Adams told commissioners.
GCBMHRS is supported by two levies — the one up for a vote this year and a 0.5-mill levy that was last passed in 2016.
Adams told commissioners over 7,500 Geauga County residents are receiving mental health services of some kind, and about 12,000 total are reached when including prevention education.
The board tries to keep local levies as flat as possible by funding initiatives through state and federal grants, he said.
“We’ve been awarded a total of about $664,000 in competitive grants over the last three months for opioids specifically,” Adams said. “That runs the gamut, whether it’s prevention, whether it’s housing, whether residential treatment, peer supports, all those.”
This year, the board will fund the Red Tulip Project, a sober house for women in recovery, through a grant for housing.
“This would be the first time that program received any dollars at all, because it’s (funded by) 100 percent private money by that committee and everything else,” Commissioner Jim Dvorak noted.
Also receiving grant funding will be a project through the Geauga County Sheriff’s Office and the Chardon Police Department. Within 24-72 hours of an overdose, a quick response team will be sent out to engage the person with the aim of getting them into treatment, Adams said.
Not everyone at the meeting was pleased with Adams’ presentation.
Former Commissioner Walter “Skip” Claypool questioned the need for continued spending on public mental health services without clear outcomes.
“You know I keep hearing dollars, dollars, dollars,” Claypool said. “Dollars don’t solve problems, we know that because the (Ohio) Department of Education throws a gazillion dollars at education and it’s gotten worse.
“At some point in time, the taxpayers are going to expect that we’re going to see a reduction in drugs, a reduction in the impacts to our society, and hopefully — and I’ve never seen it happen, but maybe it will — reducing some of these programs.”
Claypool pointed out the county’s new drug court docket, which should begin working with participants by the end of June, as an ongoing obligation and a liability to the taxpayers.
Adams said the spending on treatment and drug programs is a trade-off, and new programs can save money when they replace outdated models.
“When we started working on reducing state hospitalization 20 years ago, we had an individual in the state hospital that had been there for 26 years,” Adams said, adding there were others who had been there almost as long.
“Each one of those individuals today, if they were still there, would cost $500-600 per day, 365 days, for 26 years,” he said.
New, cheaper programs allowed the county to bring those individuals into the community, where they can be employed and participate in society, Adam said.
“Last year, I believe the number of bed days, compared to thousands 25 years ago, was about 700. So compare thousands of bed days at $550, $600 a day, to 700 bed days at $550 a day, that’s the value-added piece that comes by having some of these programs in place,” he said.
Adams said the drug court is another example where people who would otherwise be in jail or prison for years are able to maintain employment and relationships while receiving treatment at a much lower cost to taxpayers.
“But Jim, when somebody’s in jail, they don’t get treatment, but they’re clean because they don’t get drugs,” Claypool said. “To say that there’s no treatment in jail, that’s true, there is no treatment, but there is a withdrawal and they don’t get the drug going to jail.”
Claypool said he has looked at the recidivism rate for drug courts and they don’t appear to him to save people.
“The recidivism in coming out of prison is virtually 90 percent,” Adams said. “If somebody’s in (Lake-Geauga Recovery Centers) and goes to their residential treatment, they are clean a year later at a 70 percent rate. The national rates are half that.”
He added the public sees the cost savings in a reduced need for arrests and police presence in the community and reduced court costs.
The costs to the public are multiplied by not having treatment, he said.
“Statistics show only between 30 and 50 percent of people (suffering from addiction) ever walk into a treatment center,” Adams said. “So it isn’t a matter of reducing the number of people getting treatment, it’s a matter of reducing the number of people that are in jail, that are in prison, that die, because the cost to the economy of individuals that are overdosing, that’s the cost that you see the savings in.”
