ADVOCACY NEWS FROM NAMI NEW JERSEY :
1. INMATE'S DEATH RAISES MENTAL HEALTH ISSUES
2. FAMILY CRISIS EXPOSES SYSTEM FLAWS
3. STATE TO ACT ON FATE OF HOSPITAL FOR TROUBLED KIDS
4. DEPT. OF HUMAM SERVICES BUDGET FORUMS
5. FAMILY FEARS FOR WOMAN'S HEALTH IF SHE IS DEPORTED
6. ENTITLEMENT COSTS ARE EXPECTED TO SOAR
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INMATE'S DEATH RAISES MENTAL HEALTH ISSUES
Stanley Washington checked himself into a mental health program in Newark 11 years ago. On Saturday, Washington was found beaten to death in his cell at the Essex County Jail in Newark . The 50-year-old man had been in the county jail since late November after he was arrested in East Orange and charged with resisting arrest, taking a police officer's weapon, two counts of aggravated assault and two counts of simple assault.
Read the Star Ledger Story:
http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/essex/index.ssf?/base/news-4/1080113576200760.xml
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FAMILY CRISIS EXPOSES SYSTEM FLAWS
A majority of the people in the prison system are either suffering from mental illness or addiction problems, said Goodman, founder and coordinator of the law enforcement education program for the New Jersey chapter of the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill.
Read Alan Guenther's story in the Courier-Post:
http://www.southjerseynews.com/issues/march/m032104b.htm
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STATE TO ACT ON FATE OF HOSPITAL FOR TROUBLED KIDS
DYFS reform could shut Brisbane facility
The future of New Jersey 's only psychiatric hospital for children will be decided within the next 45 days as part of an agreement announced yesterday between the state and a court-appointed panel on a $320 million plan to remake the Division of Youth and Family Services. The facility has had a chronic problem of retaining children who have been cleared for discharge because the state lacks other mental health facilities to treat them. The Office of the Child Advocate is currently investigating conditions at Brisbane .
Read Susan Livio's:
http://www.nj.com/statehouse/ledger/index.ssf?/base/news-1/1079766679224360.xml
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DEPT. OF HUMAM SERVICES BUDGET FORUMS SCHEDULED
The New Jersey Department of Human Services has scheduled two Regional Budget Forums for the Fiscal Year 2005. There will be a presentation of the FY 2005 DHS budget. The dates and locations are as follows.
March 29th 1PM to 4PM
Middlesex County Fire Academy
Fire Station Drive
Sayerville , NJ
Directions: http://co.middlesex.nj.us/fireacademy/directions.asp
April 2nd 1PM to 4PM
UMDNJ- SOM
Academic Center Auditorium
42 East Laurel Road
Stratford , NJ
Directions: http://som.umdnj.edu/for_patients/directions.htm
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FAMILY FEARS FOR WOMAN'S HEALTH IF SHE IS DEPORTED
Her psychiatrists say Rita DiPeppe has been scarred, to the point of psychosis and multiple suicide attempts, by one separation after another.
Now DiPeppe, who pleaded guilty to aggravated manslaughter for fatally shooting her estranged husband could again be severed from everyone and everything she knows. She is being deported to Italy this month under a 1996 mandate from Congress that noncitizens who commit certain crimes be sent back to their countries once they have done their time. Only Gov. McGreevey can stop her deportation.
Read the full story in the Philadelphia Inquirer:
http://www.philly.com/mld/philly/news/local/8187880.htm?1c
Contact Governor McGreevey about this injustice:
http://www.state.nj.us/governor/govmail.html
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ENTITLEMENT COSTS ARE EXPECTED TO SOAR
Trustees for Medicare and Social Security are reporting that the two entitlement programs will eventually need more than twice as much money as previously estimated, experts who helped prepare the calculations say. The new estimates are likely to intensify the political battle over entitlement programs for the elderly, whose costs are expected to soar as the oldest of the nation's baby boomers reach retirement age toward the end of this decade.
Read the New York Times article, free to register
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/19/politics/19MEDI.html?ex=1080715063&ei=1&en=abd28c8c15abb8ea
