Commentaries from the Edge

The Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health (LACDMH) has developed a robust way of delivering vital services to people suffering from a mental health crisis. It has grown over the years and rests firmly in 2024, in a campaign called - “Who Do I Call for Help”? It is a campaign for the community introducing a national number #988, available 24/7. That number is a key part of the LACDMH program, the Alternative Crisis Response Unit. It is an alternative because it frees Police and directs these type of calls to people who have the expertise to bring support to the crisis. Reuben Wilson is the LACDMH head of that Unit and responsible for coordinating the many teams of people and community resources ready to respond to the incoming calls. He comes to that position with over a decade of experience working with personnel responding to crisis as a Deputy Mayor with the former Mayor of Los Angeles. The Help Line, #988 is linked to the staff of the Didi Hirsch organization and in partnership with LACDMH, begins the process of bringing trained caring to callers in emotional crisis. The continuing message to the public is that there is a Countywide system in place providing - someone to call, someone who will respond and somewhere to go if treatment and further care is needed. Reuben explains how this safety net for those in emotional crisis works as he readies to spread posters and cards across the vast region of the sprawling County of Los Angeles, California, advertising that help for all in need is a call away. 9-8-8, for support with suicidal crisis or mental health-related distress. The LACDMH 24/7 access number for help is 1-800-854-7771 The National Suicide Crisis Line is #988

A few years ago the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health (LACDMH) went forward to create new kinds of services in unchartered waters. What developed was a courageous and innovative program called, Street Psychiatry-HOME (Homeless Outreach Mobile Engagement) Team. It was courageous because certain techniques to help seriously mentally ill people living on the streets had never been tried before. Innovative because a Psychiatrist was bringing care outside to the streets, and The Team was made up of various disciplines - Nurses, Social Workers, Peers - all working as one to save lives. This episode is the final one of a four part series on the story of this program’s successes, with Elizabeth Cope, the Administrator and Co-Manager of 220 staff who are spread throughout the Los Angeles, California area. Here is another program leader with the same kind of dedication and enthusiasm that is bringing positive results and awards of recognition for their excellence in serving the unhoused. The program model takes will, takes funding and takes vision to implement in stemming the tide in Los Angeles and other locales, of people pouring onto the streets to live under freeway passes, tents and other ways, unable to be housed, living in dire circumstances. The LACDMH is investing in this model with the department’s motto as an operating attitude - Hope, Wellness and Recovery. The LACDMH 24/7 access number for help is 1-800-854-7771 The National Suicide Crisis Line is #988

We are continuing with a series of episodes on Street Psychiatry, learning about various parts of the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health (LACDMH)’s program called The HOME Team. Guests on this episode are key to the program’s successes, treating people like in an open air hospital to save lives. They are Dr. Yelena Koldolskaya, Psychiatric Supervisor and Medical Director over a team of people working in the southern region of Los Angeles, California, and Isidro, Alvarez, Medical Caseworker. Together, we learn from them what happens when they meet someone with no housing in a critical condition who refuses to receive treatment. They monitor the person over time, and hope to create a partnership of care with them to see if they have to move the person into involuntary care, what is called a Conservatorship. This means that someone like a family member if possible, takes control over their life decisions as a way of preventing them from dying on the streets. It is an extreme decision and requires a Court decision. Dr. K. as she is commonly called, and Isidro, work together in this part of the HOME Team’s programming. Both of them see people in circumstances most never experience. Listen to the story of the woman living on the bus bench and what happens when Dr. K’s skills as a Medical Director and Isidro with his expertise in the Conservatorship process, come to address the woman’s dire situation. It is an example of a HOME Team success. Like in many cultures, there is the saying, “when you save one life, it is as if you have saved an entire world”. The LACDMH 24/7 access number for help is 1-800-854-7771 The National Suicide Crisis Line is #988

As the last series of podcast episodes highlighting the new CARE Court, a Superior Court of the State of California, initiated in December of 2023, our guest is Dr. Sarah Church, Supervising Psychologist of the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health (LACDMH), who has stories to tell. She has watched individuals with mental illness begin to grow and to turn their life around as they benefitted from the CARE Court programming. She further reminds the listeners how a Petition filed for someone with mental illness is reviewed by the Presiding Judge of the Court as the first step in someone qualifying to receive this menu of services. These services in CARE Court in partnership with LACDMH are available from various government agencies such as Public Health and the Public Defenders offices as well as many community organizations. Sarah’s role is to act as a liaison to those collaborators, and to support her staff who are on the frontlines offering care. Listen to her stories and with her we can celebrate the success the program is having in helping people with mental illness enter into a continuum of recovery and hope for the future. To Learn more about CARE Court and how to Petition for someone in need: Go to the website, www.LACourt.org/CARE

In shining a light on some new developments in services at the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health (LACDMH), CARE Court is a perfect example. Launched in December of 2023, and funded by the State of California, the department has joined an exciting collaboration of government agencies and community organizations fostering a wide systemic change. The CARE stands for Community Assistance, Recovery and Empowerment and in this episode you will hear from a leader who heads an organization that gives that community assistance. Harold Turner is the Executive Director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) Urban Los Angeles. NAMI was started by a group of families over 40 years ago to find answers on how to help family members with mental illness and to support one another. Today, there are 600 chapters across the U. S. renown for providing education and support groups. With CARE Court, Mr. Turner with his members accompanies families to Court and helps them navigate the mental health, health and legal systems, to develop an effective plan of recovery and empowerment for those who qualify for the services from this new kind of Court. He brings to this important programmatic development experience as a Father of a mentally ill child, and as a community leader on the Workgroup of the State of California CARE ACT, a member of the LACDMH Commission, and as an Executive Director of NAMI Urban LA, with decades of effective advocacy for the improvement of mental health treatments. LACDMH values the collaboration with Mr. Turner and his organization working together to foster recovery for those living with mental illness. To Contact NAMI Urban LA, go to the website, www.namiurbanla.org, tel. (323) 294-7814, write - 4305 Degnan Blvd. Suite 104, Los Angeles, CA 90008

As the special series on the podcast program continues, this is the final episode exploring Peer Resource Centers at the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health (LACDMH). We are visiting with Jaime Gomez on the Eastside of the City, a Supervising Community Health Worker who relishes that his programming specializes in reaching out into neighborhoods. In other words, instead of being located at a particular building, Jaime and his team use parks, libraries and schools to connect with individuals, families and the elderly who are in need but may never visit a traditional office for mental health services. In their unique way of being accessible and available, Jaime explains how they have an opportunity to help people where they are, and make them realize that having emotional difficulties for themselves or a family member are part of being human. He feels this approach is a way to break the stigma of mental illness and encourage people to receive help. In this episode, listeners around the world will wish that they could be at the place wherever Jaime and his team organize what they call, COFFEE WITH A SIDE OF HEALING, a relaxing and innovative way of encountering mental health services. The LACDMH 24/7 access number for help is 1-800-854-7771 The National Suicide Crisis Line is #988

The launching of a new series of episodes on this podcast, COMMENTARIES FROM THE EDGE, is covering important aspects of innovative and powerfully effective ways of supporting and promoting mental health. The projects, beginning with what is called the Peer Resource Centers, are part of the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health (LACDMH) in California. Given that many people will not enter into offices that are part of a traditional governmental program, with the operation of these Centers you have, “a welcoming place where everyone coming for help is greeted by others who also have faced emotional difficulties” - surrounded by warm and caring individuals with the “lived experience”. In these two episodes you will hear from outstanding staff at LACDMH, Catherine Clay and Joseph Cuevas in Episode #1 and Tosha Sweet and Tammy Lofton in Episode #2. Each of them will be describing the kind of successes in mental health programming that is possible, and through their stories show how this approach is needed in neighborhoods across all communities. The LACDMH 24/7 access number for help is 1-800-854-7771 The National Suicide Crisis Lifeline is #988

There is courage and there is sacrifice, and Ruth Belonsky’s life is an example of both. Born into the world of Apartheid in South Africa, she grew up in an area called East London near Cape Town, segregated like everywhere in that Country. A child of immigrants from Germany, she believes that hearing stories of how her family escaped from the Nazis, motivated her to seek ways to end the laws separating people by race and color. As a young adult she entered politics and was elected to her City Council, all the while secretly participating in what were illegal activities that brought Blacks and Whites together. Listen to her telling of harrowing stories, and to her outspoken commitments against Apartheid, which eventually led to her and her family being forced to leave South Africa to save their lives. Today, in Los Angeles, California, she continues a life of social activism bringing people together across faiths and races to create a more just society.