Editor’s note: This article is by Jacob Colon, of the Bennington Banner, in which it was first published May 20, 2015.
[N]ORTH BENNINGTON — The Center for the Advancement of Public Action at Bennington College recently hosted a panel discussion that explored the treatment of incarcerated individuals with mental and public health issues and discussed alternative solutions to such treatment.
Part of the center’s second “Incarceration in America” conference, the discussion featured five women who direct programs that assist incarcerated individuals with their mental or public health needs.
“The college is grateful to all those who have so generously given their time, expertise, and talents to help further the goals of the Incarceration in America Initiative,” said Bennington College faculty member Annabel Davis-Goff.
The first speaker was Cheryl Roberts, executive director of the Greenburger Center for Social and Criminal Justice, which advocates for reforms to the criminal justice system in New York City and upstate New York. According to Roberts, out of the 2.4 million people currently incarcerated in the United States, about 1.6 million – or 40 percent — of them have mental illnesses. Many of these people did not go directly from their homes to jail, either.
“Over the last 40 or 50 years there has been a transinstitutionalization of people from mental hospitals to prisons and jails,” she said, noting that between 1955 and 1994 the number of people with severe mental illnesses in hospitals dropped from 560,000 to 70,000.
Panelist Ruth Zimmer described how when she worked at a psychiatric hospital in Rochester, N.Y., in the 1970s, buses full of patients deemed ready for discharge were driven back to New York City and dropped off with no further assistance.
“A ll of the things that had been promised that would be there when we started to deinstitutionalize the hospitals — that there would be services and housing in those communities to greet and serve those people — that didn’t happen,” she said.
When Zimmer started an outreach program in Manhattan, she would receive the same patients she knew from the Rochester hospital — now homeless, without psychiatric care since being discharged and often self-medicating with drugs. She strove to develop housing for people facing such issues. In 2002, Zimmer founded Housing+Solutions in New York City, which provides permanent housing for homeless women — single or with families — with substance abuse, mental health disabilities or criminal justice histories. In 2010, Housing+Solutions opened Drew House, the first ever program in America that provides an alternative to incarceration for families.
“I believe in a housing first model, that people have to have housing as an anchor,” she said. “I think all of us tonight are going to pull a key out of our pocket, unlock our door and be at home. And you’re going to feel really good about being home.”
Treatment in prisons
Not only is the lack of health treatment outside of jails and prisons an issue, but the same goes for treatment inside of these facilities, many several panelists argued.
JoAnne Page, president and CEO of the Fortune Society, argued that people often enter jails or prisons with trauma and then compound that with the violence they experience during their stay. Forty percent of juveniles sent to the Rikers Island jail complex in New York City experience violence during their stay, she said. Additionally, she cited criminal justice advocate and writer Bryan Stevenson in his finding that juveniles who are jailed in towns where no juvenile facilities exist are kept in solitary confinement for long periods of time.
“If you wanted to create mental illness, we know how to do it really well in the criminal justice system,” Page stated. “And if you want to make it worse, leaving somebody in solitary confinement is one of the most effective ways we know.”
The Fortune Society both advocates for incarcerated individuals and administers alternative to incarceration programs. One barrier to the providing mental health treatment for incarcerated people is that facilities prefer containment over treatment, she said, exemplified by practices like prolonged solitary confinement. Another is the New York City district attorney’s refusal to accept alternative programs due to fear of how the public will respond.
“‘If I let the system proceed as it normally does, even if it chews people up and the outcomes are much worse, then I’m not responsible for what happens afterward,’” is the message she perceives from the DA. “So we see a system that’s rigged toward not taking the up front risk of making a different decision, but essentially putting people in and letting them end up there long enough that they get time served.”
Cara Smith, director of the Cook County jail in Illinois since 2013, echoed Page’s sentiments.
“I really believe more and more every day that if you want to address mass incarceration in this country, we have to change who is running these systems,” said Smith. “You shouldn’t have people running the system that started out as a correctional officer or a prison guard because they don’t view the world in a way that will allow change to occur.”
In Cook County jail, while the number of incarcerated people reached a record low since she started there, the 30 percent of the jail population who suffered from mental illnesses is a record high that has been consistent since her arrival. Smith spoke of one inmate plagued by severe self-harm issues who has already cost the jail over $1 million in surgical and treatment fees in addition to his being confined and surrounded by guards daily.
“We’re talking about a criminal justice system that has put record numbers of people in custody, and jails have to start speaking up because we see what’s going on,” she said. “It’s too easy for all of the upstream partners — the police that arrest, the prosecutors, the defense attorneys and judges — it’s very easy for those stakeholders to look away from the decisions that are made when people are placed in custody.”
Severe mental illness
According to Ann-Marie Louison, co-director of Adult Behavioral Health Center Programs at CASES in New York City, 17 percent of incarcerated individuals in America suffer from severe mental illnesses, specifically schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders. Additionally, over six times as many women in jails are have mental illnesses as do men, she said.
Though she strongly agrees that psychiatric treatment helps address mental health symptoms, Louison maintained that homelessness, disconnection from family and lack of education are the underlying factors holding people back with mental illnesses from living successful lives.
“Prosecutors are saying, ‘They need to take their medication.’ There are many cases of people who have recovered from mental illness who, when they tell their stories, it’s not about medications,” she said. “It’s about, ‘Someone loved me, believed in me. I have purpose in my life.’ You know, the things that keep us going every day. I’m doing well, I got a good grade. Those are the things that are important to people with serious mental illnesses.”
Louison also drew a strong correlation between the country’s highest jail populations — African American and Latino males — and their severe lack of access to mental health treatment outside of jail. In fact, jails are the only institutions in which all people are eligible for mental health treatment under the Constitution regardless of their financial situations, she noted.
“So this is also about race and access to treatment and health care for people who are black. For black men,” she said. “We don’t do a good job in the community of helping people that have schizophrenia and depression who are men and black men to get access and to accept those services.”
How to get involved
When Bennington College students asked how they could get involved in addressing the issues discussed during the panel, all of the speakers agreed that volunteering at a local jail or outreach program is a strong starting point.
“What people are dealing with is basic human stuff,” JoAnne Page said on the topic of volunteers having everyday conversations with her clients. “Like, what does it mean to worry about love, and what do you need when you’re thinking about your future? As a young person talking to a young person, truth be told, you’re dealing with the same stuff, only with less obstacles.”
This year’s “Incarceration in America” conference theme was “Effecting Change,” and three other panel discussions were conducted throughout the weekend including topics like prisoners’ rights and taking public action. More information about this initiative can be found at http://www.bennington.edu/Benningtonandtheworld/CAPA/CAPAprogram/incarceration-in-america.
