Alliance Alert: Advocates representing law enforcement, recovering people, family members, mental health, housing and disability rights groups gathered today at a well-attended news conference where they called on state policy makers to increase funding for community models with records of great success in voluntarily engaging and supporting people with major mental health, housing and basic needs, rather than to increase the use of involuntary mental hygiene arrests, transport and hospital admissions as well as outpatient commitment orders. They also called on New York City to make available 2,000-4,000 currently empty supportive housing beds and New York State to fully bring up crisis stabilization centers and implement incident panels to investigate episodes of violence and to publicly share their findings and recommendations to prevent future tragedies.
Family Members, Law Enforcement, and Housing Advocates
Call for Housing not Handcuffs and Hospitals,
Expansion of Access to Services not Involuntary Treatment
Contact: Harvey Rosenthal, CEO, Alliance for Rights and Recovery | 518-527-0567
Luke Sikinyi, Vice President of Public Policy | 518-703-0264
Albany, NY — Family members, former and current law enforcement professionals, housing advocates, and mental health and disability rights organizations gathered at the Capitol today to urge Governor Hochul and the Legislature to expand investments in voluntary, community-based mental health and substance use services and to reject proposals that call on police officers to make psychiatric assessments that can lead to the use of handcuffs, involuntary police transport and inpatient commitments.
“I have stood on the front lines as a detective,” said NYS Assemblyman Kwani B. O’Pharrow. “I know: We honor both law enforcement and the people they serve by giving the right response — not asking them to fight battles they were never trained to win.”
“While police are needed to address dangerous situations and investigate crimes, we are not equipped to provide mental health support,” said Lt. Diane Goldstein (Ret.), Executive Director of the Law Enforcement Action Partnership. “Deploying trained community responders to mental health crises and ensuring people have access to housing and services so they avoid those crises in the first place not only makes for better outcomes, it also frees up time and resources for law enforcement to focus on serious crime.”
The advocates urged lawmakers and the public to reject pressure to make public policy based on fear and not the facts, citing a continuum of program models that have high records of success in engaging and supporting people in mental health crisis.
“We do not have to choose between public safety and protecting people’s rights,” said Harvey Rosenthal, CEO of the Alliance for Rights and Recovery. “We can do both by investing in the right services that actually help people, reduce crisis calls, and not burden the police with jobs meant for mental health experts.”
Several speakers shared heartbreaking stories of family members who lost their lives after enduring the pain of involuntary hospitalization and the absence of an appropriate discharge plan.
“My father’s death would have been prevented if he was discharged from the hospital with the support or follow-up services he desperately needed,” said Robert Dodge. “Expanding involuntary commitment won’t fix a system that still sends people out the door with nowhere to go. What we need is better discharge planning, housing, and real services—before and after a crisis.
“As a parent, I’ve seen how traumatizing and damaging involuntary commitment can be; how it leaves our loved ones distrustful, and how harmful it can be when they’re discharged from hospitals without support or follow-up,” said Russell Stence, President of Family Alliance for Mental Health Recovery. “The answer is not more force—it’s access to holistic/integrative care, peer support, more housing, community-based support.”
Advocates are calling for much stronger investments in:
- Stronger discharge planning requirements so people aren’t released from hospitals without connection to effective services or housing
- Housing First programs that have long histories of success at engaging, housing and supporting people with major mental illnesses by combining supportive housing with Assertive Community Treatment teams.
- Peer led outreach and hospital to community Bridger programs
- Full implementation of Daniel’s Law, which would deploy trained health and peer crisis teams instead of police whenever possible
The advocates called on the state to end resistance to the use of statutorily approved incident review panels that will investigate incidents of violence and offer public recommendations that will improve mental health and criminal justice responses to people in crisis.”
A report issued this week by the Legal Aid Society revealed that thousands wait for housing and services that are the true and lasting answers to the mental health crisis in New York City and the state.
“Yet New York City has yet to fill 2,000-4,000 empty supportive housing beds and New York State has yet to bring up the full number of Crisis Stabilization Centers that were first announced in 2022,” said Luke Sikinyi, VP for Public Policy of the Alliance for Rights and Recovery.
“This isn’t just a budget issue—it’s a human issue,” said Doug Cooper, Interim Executive Director of the Association of Community Living. “We have vacant supportive housing units across the state while people with mental health needs are sleeping on sidewalks. That’s a policy failure that we can fix right now.”
“We must bring up new beds and shore up our existing housing as well through increases to the New York State Supportive Housing Program and a 7.8% increase on existing behavioral health contracts,” said Stephen Piasecki, State Policy Manager for The Supportive Housing Network of New York.
“To address this mental health crisis, we need the State to invest in a community-based approach and in families, who are often the first responders when someone is struggling with a mental health challenge. Investing in family support, education and empowerment is a wise and strong preventative measure. These programs not only keep people with serious mental illness out of crisis, but they also ensure that involuntary hospitalization remains a last resort,” said Jonathan Chung, Policy Director at NAMI-NYC, helping families and individuals affected by mental illness for over 40 years.