Letter: Less-than-adequate care for mentally ill is a travesty

There is a large group of people in our community who are being swept under the carpet. Our mentally ill do not have a proper crisis response detox system.

There was a human and health services review, which stated that the counties should address multiple problems with crisis response, with diversion from the criminal justice system and co-occurring orders. Our officials decided to ignore the review. When we have our mentally ill getting less-than-adequate care in or out of jail, it is a travesty. We have already lost someone in Benton County jail from this problem.

The question I would like to ask is, where are our supposed representatives, who should be passing legislation to protect those most at risk? Do we just throw away people because we have a disease most people don’t understand? I believe our representatives need to wake up and realize this problem is touching a great number of people in our community.

We are ready to talk, to let them know what we experience every day. We really just wish we could get them to listen.

This story was originally published May 22, 2016 at 1:38 AM with the headline "Letter: Less-than-adequate care for mentally ill is a travesty."