Editor’s note: This op-ed is by Anne Donahue, who sat in on last week’s meeting in Berlin and is a state representative from Northfield and co-chair of the Mental Health Oversight Committee.
To hear media reports last week, residents of Berlin were pressing the administration to make sure it doesn’t build Vermont’s new psychiatric hospital anywhere near its elementary school.
The reports imply old stigmas: the fear of patient escapes endangering children.
That wasn’t an accurate picture of comments at a meeting held to give town folk the opportunity to provide input about two building sites the state is considering.
In fact, the word “school” didn’t come up once, apart from a reference in a completely different context.
What the residents, select board and school board all showed was a clear-eyed understanding about both good town planning and good medical care.
The state began its presentation with officials and a day care operator from Waterbury to talk about what a problem-free neighbor the state hospital had been there. The state explained its security, and why the school would remain safe.
When residents had their turn to speak, they were on a whole different track.
Two residents provided detailed descriptions of the town’s longstanding economic development goals for the large swath of “plateau” that is bordered by an auto dealership, the Berlin Mall, the school, the firehouse, and the state regional library – the state’s site option “A.”
Berlin doesn’t have a town center that brings its disparate parts together as a community. The school doesn’t connect to any neighborhood. (Therein, the one use of the word, “school.”) This large piece of open land has been its one hope to develop that kind of an economic and social base.
Other comments noted why it made sense to provide various medical services, including psychiatric hospital care, along one same stretch of property. Property option “B” is contiguous to the Central Vermont Medical Center campus.
Unlike the stereotypical NIMBY reaction (Not In My Back Yard) there has been no opposition expressed to hosting the new psychiatric hospital, as long as it is located in a way that is consistent with good planning.
Jeb Spaulding, the Secretary of Administration, said the key to the state’s decision would be to discern what was best for patients and what best respected the views of the town of Berlin.
In other words Berlin is setting an example for the right way to collaborate with the mental health needs of our relatives, friends and neighbors.
Early in the meeting, Jeb Spaulding, the Secretary of Administration, said the key to the state’s decision would be to discern what was best for patients and what best respected the views of the town of Berlin. He said the state is currently pursuing both properties simultaneously.
Spaulding said that in the ideal world those two interests would be “in sync.”
As it turns out, they are.
The “weight” among clinical experts is a preference for the CVMC site, Spaulding said in answer to a public question.
He also received a joint letter last week from individual mental health peers, advocates and professionals with the Vermont chapters of the National Association of Social Workers, the National Alliance for Mental Illness, the Mental Health Counselors Association and the ACLU, as well as from Disability Rights Vermont, the Mental Health Law Project of Vermont Legal Aid, and the Vermont Psychiatric Association.
The letter asked the administration to consider “the site that can [best] bring all the resources of a medical center.”
The Lgislature’s Mental Health Oversight Committee, full House, and full Senate each adopted the principle this past winter that, “The mental health system shall be integrated into the overall health care system, including the location of any new inpatient psychiatric facilities adjacent to or incorporated with a medical hospital.”
This week, the administration has announced that it did, indeed, “take to heart” the input of the residents of Berlin and the mental health community. Spaulding wrote to town officials to say that the governor has agreed that the site adjacent to the medical complex will be pursued as the “preferred location.”
Everyone is now “in sync,” and for all the right reasons.
Donahue later added this notation: This week, the administration has announced that it did, indeed, “take to heart” the input of the residents of Berlin and the mental health community. Spaulding wrote to town officials to say that the governor has agreed that the site adjacent to the medical complex will be pursued as the “preferred location.” Everyone is indeed now in sync, and for all the right reasons.
