State Budget Cuts Drive Group Facility For Mentally Ill Into Foreclosure, Forcing Patients From Their Long-Time Home

In Chillicothe, Ohio, The Columbus Dispatch reports:

• A state budget cut forced one of Rob Stanley's group homes for the mentally ill into foreclosure - and pushed "Sheriff Bob" off the front porch where he had sat nearly every day for 15 years waving and smiling at passers-by on Paint Street. Of all the groups affected by state budget rationing, the mentally ill may been hit the hardest.

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• Small group homes like Stanley's are one of the last refuges for mentally ill adults turned out of state hospitals. Stanley had 10 residents in two group homes. When two moved out, he was unable to replace them because budget cuts froze funding for new residential state supplemental payments. As a result, he lost $1,548 a month, couldn't pay his mortgage, and watched as the sheriff padlocked the front door on his home at 104 S. Paint St.

• The residents, some of whom had lived there since the early 1990s, had to move elsewhere; two were able to move to Stanley's other home. But Robert Chester, 88, affectionately known as "Sheriff" by fellow residents and people who recognized him from his regular spot on the front porch, had a particularly hard time adjusting. "It was the most horrible thing I've every gone through in my life," Stanley said. "It was like losing your child."

• Stanley fought to hold back tears when he said he feels he let the residents down. "This was their home. They were settled in." [...] Mental-health "drop-in centers," where many people with mental illness spend their days, are closing or greatly reducing hours. Most programs providing help with housing, education and employment already have fallen by the wayside, officials said.

For the story, see Mentally ill are losing some of their last refuges.