COSIG CONFERENCE BROCHURE.pdf - Drexel University College ...

are perceived as necessary for state hospital discharge, even though individuals
might have done very well being discharged into their own apartments or other
residential settings of their own choosing had the necessary service supports
and evidence based treatment practices been available.
• The state requires the provider of CRRS and LTSR facilities (whether the county
operates the program or sub-contracts to a provider agency), to own the property,
and be the landlord to the residents. The costs associated only with housing
(rent/mortgage, taxes, utilities, etc.) are built into the contracts or budgets for
CRRS and LTSR’s operated by Counties and their contracted provider agencies.
The money for this kind of program is allocated by the state to the county
MH/MR program, and thus community housing for persons with a serious mental
illness living in “group homes” is paid for by the state. Because staffing and
support services are integrated into the CRRS program and are site based, the
flexibility to separate housing from service components is not currently easy to
do, limiting opportunities for creative change.
• In the group home model, CRRS and LTSR’s are frequently perceived as the only
choice for moving consumers from state hospitals to the community. In order to
serve newly released persons at the top of the residential services pipeline the
bottom must be free and clear. This means that individuals must continue to
move into less restrictive settings at all levels of the program, so that new persons
needing residential services can be placed, according to the level of supervision
and staffing deemed appropriate, into an available “slot”. When the pipeline is
clogged, i.e., no movement is occurring at the least restrictive staffed level, the
whole system backs up, and is in effect static rather than dynamic. Hence, when
persons are due to be moved from state hospitals into the community, new
funding to develop additional CRRS must be appropriated and allocated.
• Overall, the desire to serve persons with mental illness effectively in the
community through a recovery oriented flexible system that can adapt to meet
changing circumstances is hampered by the constraints of the most prevalent
current residential model, which combines housing and treatment in one bundled
service; and by failure in the system to support or encourage counties to develop
appropriate recovery oriented supports and effective local housing options for
consumers with mental disabilities.
Re-thinking housing options - what can the OMHSAS do differently?
The OMHSAS has promoted the development of alternatives to CRRS and LTSR’s for
almost a decade, and a variety of local housing options, including supported housing have
successfully been built.
OMHSAS must:
• Promote the concept that consumers should have choices, within reasonable
funding constraints to live where they please in the community.
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