After months of searching nationwide for a new commissioner of the Department of Mental Health, the Shumlin administration on Thursday called on a longtime, local leader to grab the reins of the department: Paul Dupre.
Dupre, the director of Washington County Mental Health Services Inc., is a strong supporter of the administration’s decentralized approach to rebuilding the mental health system. The Vermont State Hospital in Waterbury was abandoned after Tropical Storm Irene inundated the psychiatric facility in 2011, and instead of rebuilding a hospital of equal size, Gov. Peter Shumlin and his staff decided to provide services at facilities around the state.
“Paul has a long record of commitment to Vermont’s mental health community and has been an aggressive advocate for improving the lives of Vermonters who deal with mental health issues,” Shumlin said in a statement Thursday. “He will help us reshape our system into a community-based system where Vermonters can receive the care and services they need closer to home.”
Dupre, who joined Washington County Mental Health in 1978, has a tall task ahead of him. He will take over a department July 1 that has been marked by leadership changes and is in the midst of a crisis, plagued by psychiatric bed shortages across the state. Dupre will be the fifth commissioner of the Department of Mental Health since Shumlin took office in 2011.
But he is also taking over just as acute care facilities in Rutland, Brattleboro and Morrisville have come online. Residential facilities in Middlesex and Westford are slated to begin accepting patients in June and July. Rutland Regional Medical Center will add four beds in the fall. And the state has laid the foundation for a new psychiatric hospital in Berlin, which is set to open its doors in May 2014. A meeting of the Legislature’s Joint Mental health Oversight Committee will determine in November whether to move forward with 16 or 25 beds for the facility.
Dupre said that he is ready to take on the challenge of implementing a system spread out across the state, rather than centering on a large state hospital, as the former system was.
“This is a very innovative and great approach to treating folks with mental illness,” he said. “It’s a cultural change, a change of how we provide services for mental illness, and change takes time.”
Dupre and interim Commissioner of Mental Health Mary Moulton will swap employers, and they may even swap posts, as Moulton plans to apply for the Dupre’s position.
Moulton took a leave from her post as chief of operations at Washington County Mental Health to help the department after Tropical Storm Irene. She then took over as acting commissioner in late 2012, when Patrick Flood unexpectedly left the post.
Moulton’s last day as interim commissioner will be May 31, and deputy commissioner Frank Reed will take over for the month before Dupre begins.
Moulton points to the mental health training programs for law enforcement officials as one of her crowning achievements.
“A year ago, 85 percent of people who were brought to the hospital involuntarily were brought in (metal) shackles,” she said. “In February, that rate dropped to a low of 6 percent.”
Another high point of Moulton’s tenure was opening the Morrisville acute care facility “against all odds,” as she put it, soon after Medical Director Jay Batra departed
“It’s been a building period,” she said of the past six months. “Overall, we have many challenges ahead. And until the state hospital comes online, our patients will have critical times waiting. But, hopefully, we’re moving toward a time next May when we can see what this system, with all of its beds, looks like. Then, we’ll really know.”
The date of Mary Moulton’s departure was incorrect in the photo caption due to an editorial error. She will be leaving her post as interim commissioner on May 31, 2013. This post was last updated at 7:45 a.m. on May 17, 2013.
