NICK GOSNELL
Hutch Post
HUTCHINSON, Kan. — Retiring Horizons Mental Health Center CEO Mike Garrett sees the legislation working its way through Congress as a potential net positive in terms of funding treatment across the country.
"That provides funding to states to allow all community mental health centers to develop a higher level of care, which is known as Certified Community Behavioral Health Care," Garrett said. "A lot of the programs to try to keep people out of higher levels of care have been available, that we can develop, by virtue of a grant that we received from SAHMSA to become a Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinic. That piece of legislation will allow that to develop all across the country and to the other community mental health centers in Kansas that weren't lucky enough to obtain such a grant."
Horizons was one of only six community mental health centers in Kansas selected as recipients of the expansion grants. Garrett believes red flag laws may have procedural problems.
"The red flag law, as least as I understand it at this point in time, is an alert that a person may have a history of mental illness, may have access to guns, and so the court's going to intervene and take those guns," Garrett said. "The challenge will be the assessment that says that person can have those guns back and the variability of treatment and the waxing and waning of symptoms. In theory, I think it makes a lot of sense. I'm not sure, on a practical level, it's not going to run into a lot of problems."
Garrett also cited a statistic that clarified the difference between ongoing mental illness and the anger and rage that prompts acts like mass shootings.
"People with mental illness are much more likely to be victimized, rather than to commit acts of violence," Garrett said. "What current research is finding is that many of those mass shootings are the result of people that are very angry, due to maybe previous abuse, bullying and social isolation. The research right now is indicating only about 4% of those type of incidents are due to people with mental illness. That stigma is being perpetuated around those major mental illnesses. I hope we'll be able to correct that."
The goal is to have the eight bed crisis stabilization facility for adults at 311 West 2nd open here in Hutchinson soon.