Here are six things to know about the cut.
1. With the budget reduction, patients who rely on government-funded mental health treatment will likely not see new or expanded programs to handle the existing strain on services, according to the report.
2. The cut will have different affects on the eight offices. Rob Robinson, CEO of Alliance Behavioral Healthcare, the office that pays for public mental health services in Wake, Durham, Johnston and Cumberland counties, told The News & Observer that he was still figuring out the exact amount his agency will lose. He claims the agency can manage for the first year, but told the publication the cut “does put at risk us doing all we want to do if it goes beyond one year.”
3. In order to help stave off the cut, state legislators told the regional health agencies, which were set up as managed care organizations in a 2011 law, to use money from their savings.
4. The original idea for cutting funds to regional mental health in North Carolina started in the North Carolina Senate, which proposed a $185.6 million cut. The North Carolina House had proposed a $2 million increase to pay for mental health urgent care, the $110 million cut was the compromise, according to the report.
5. The cut is not necessarily permanent. If a Medicaid budget surplus occurs next year, the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services can give the local mental health agencies up to $30 million back, according to the report.
6. North Carolina’s budget also looks to add 150 hospital beds for mentally ill patients needing short-term treatment using a portion of the money from the sale of the Dorothea Dix hospital property in Raleigh.
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