Minnesota Department of Human Services (DHS) has had many troubles in their mental health department. When Gov Dayton won with less than 9000 votes in 2010 and named Commissioner Jesson to head the biggest state agency brought many of her friends and staff was bitter sweet for me for many reasons. While in Autism services – things got much better, mental health not so much. Keep in mind autism falls under both mental health and disability.
One reason was I really liked Dr. Sulik the previous assistant commissioner of mental health at DHS. Dr. Sulik was very kind, approachable and spoke with us about autism which falls under mental health several times. In fact, Dr. Sulik and I had a phone conference with Dr. Insel who is the Director of National Institute of Mental Health. Dr. Sulik even spoke with two potential autism and services researchers from Columbia university and Univ of Ill – Chicago. So, my gratitude for Dr. Sulik is endless.
Then Jesson replaced Dr. Sulik with Maureen O’Connell to head mental health department at DHS. Now, many folks did not think O’Connell was qualified for this position, and she had her share of contraversial issues as reported many times. Personally, I liked O’Connell because while she did not really understand mental health policy or was a mental health doctor – she did not have one bias bone in her body. After O’Connell resigned, the current one was hired – Mr. Dave Hartford.
Mr. Hartford does not understand much about autism or seem to care. He also does not understand much about equality or seem to care. In other words, under his leadership there are still persistent and chronic mental health racial disparities as reported by MSR recently. Personally, it would be nice for the mental health department at DHS to be headed by an actual mental health professional.
Furthermore, a recent mental health legislation written by Sen Eaton who in my humble little opinion is an evil legislature that likes creating autism and mental health disparities authored SF1864 which wants to educate and train mental health workers and prevent mental health illnesses. This particular bill does NOT have any specific language of assuring equality and access for communities of color and mental health patients from minority and ethnic communities. Furthermore, it will enhance the current dire racial disparity that already exist in Minnesota mental health programs. SF1864 does not have one single word of diversity, equity and fairness in it.
As a result, I asked Mr. Hartford and his policy supervisor Brost to make language changes to this bill which requires DHS approval before it passes committees since DHS has a heavy hand on all bills regarding their jurisdiction. Their initial response was the usual (we care, we understand, blah blah & oh look we have a powerless council for reducing disparity) words then that changed to when I asked again for specific answer – let’s ignore and dismiss any equal access to training providers of color and law enforcement about mental health and diversity. Then they said Oh that will cost more money to train providers of color or law enforcement about diversity and mental health. Now what now? Um – doesn’t racial mental health disparity cost more? Wait a minute – yes it does. However, this fact and known knowledge per research seems to escape Mr. Hartford and Brost.
So, SF1864 cruises through committees with no one adding or amending current bias language to assure equality and access for mental health patients of color. In addition, Mr. Harford refuses to hire ONE single person of color for his policy advisers team. That is right the people that advise him and legislators about mental health policies are ALL White – not one of them reflects us, even though DHS is the state Medicaid agency. So, how can they possibly understand a mental health Black male patient will be shot dead or arrested by the Police and not taken for treatment as it happened to a Somali patient few years ago.
They don’t, they can’t and they never have. It is simply impossible for a White woman or man to fully comprehend what it is like to be a Black or Latino person in Minnesota. Yet – Mr. Harford seems to apply the Sandra Fluke theory here and pretend to speak for us, about us – without us. To me that is sad in 2014 in a progressive and moving forward state like Minnesota’s Medicaid agency does not have one single Black policy adviser in their mental health or anywhere else for that matter. That kind of subtle and deliberate decisions are exactly why racial health disparity exist and will continue to only get worse.
In case you still doubt mental health and racism does not exist in this country – read here and get out of living under a rock. Unless we stop and nip bills like SF1864, inequality will only get worse.
You see Mr. Hartford – ignoring our plea for equality in mental health care, access, training and services does not make disparity go away. It is your responsibility to assure all Minnesotans are treated fairly and get access to the same mental health treatment by assuring new legislations have proper language. And, you are failing at this miserably. You can’t create disparity then refer us to a powerless internal council after, you must nip and prevent racial mental health disparity from the beginning through fair and equal language in all mental health new legislations. In other words, it is better to prevent spilling milk rather than cleaning after you willingly spill it. Not only is it cost effective to prevent mental health racial disparity, but more importantly the human toll is irreplaceable. It turns out Mr. Hartford is out as well. My take good bye and good riddance. I would advice Commissioner Jesson to hire an actual mental health person for this position. I heard it might not Happen until the 2014 election.
Above words do not reflect any agency, committee or candidate.
Thanks!
Idil – Somali Autism Mom & Minority Advocate