Assembly panel hears mental health bill

Kirsten Searer

Friday, April 15, 2005 | 11:15 a.m.

CARSON CITY -- The Assembly Ways and Means Committee this morning got its first chance to hear a comprehensive bill designed to assuage the mental health crisis in Clark County.

While the committee hasn't passed the bill yet, its author, Assemblywoman Sheila Leslie, D-Reno, said she sensed growing momentum toward alloting money to the effort.

In total, Assembly Bill 175 calls for more than $17.8 million in new funds, including money for 90 new beds in existing facilities in Southern Nevada, a new 50-bed crisis unit in Southern Nevada, and the mental health courts in Clark and Washoe counties.

One of the key components is $1.8 million for a Southern Nevada triage center, designed to alleviate overloaded emergency rooms in Southern Nevada.

Mental health patients wait an average of three days for a bed in a mental health facility, Leslie said. In the meantime, they take up emergency room beds and lengthen the wait for all other patients.

Representatives of police, judges and Clark County said the triage center and mental health court should help solve the rotation of people who go in and out of the hospital and jail.

Right now, for example, about 19 percent of the 3,000 inmates in Clark County's jail are mentally ill, said Carlos Brandenburg, administrator of the Nevada Division of Mental Health and Developmental Services.

"This is something that has been needed for a long time," said Assemblyman Mo Denis, D-Las Vegas. "I know it costs a lot of money, but I think in the long run it's going to save a lot of money."