Mental health, addiction services groups to astroturf July Fourth parades

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Health-care interests are as jittery as anyone as Ohio legislators blow past a deadline to figure out ways to close a roughly $1 billion gap in the state budget.

The state’s Coalition for Healthy Communities — emboldened by reports that they’re making headway on restoring budget cuts — will use Fourth of July parades to press their case. The coalition told supporters via e-mail to gather in groups, and get particularly loud as legislators and other public officials pass by. The group also outlined a small new-media mobilization campaign to press its case.

You’ll know a parade onlooker has an ulterior motive if they’re carrying one of these signs, which were suggested in the e-mail.

• INVEST WISELY! Fund Mental Health and Addiction Recovery Services
• $1 Spent on Mental Health and Addiction Recovery Services Saves $11 Tax Dollars
• Mental Health and Addiction Recovery Services SAVE LIVES!!

“We’re hearing anecdotally they’re restoring funding, but we’re not sure [to] what extent,” said Betsy Johnson, associate executive director for the Ohio affiliate of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI). “We feel we have seven days to make sure we have everything that we can get.”

Fourth of July parades are “one opportunity to get in front of legislators one last time,” Johnson said.

The coalition includes 27 mental health and addiction services groups, including the National Alliance on Mental Illness Ohio. The groups want $31 million in Disproportionate Share Hospital funds to support patients who are awarded to state mental health hospitals by courts, as well as millions of dollars restored to the Ohio Department of Aging’s budget meant to help house people with severe mental illness and substance abuse problems.

Participants plan to gather “soundbite”-length videos of people at parades talking about the risks of cutting mental health funding, as well as snapshots of gatherings across the parade routes. Any footage from this weekend’s demonstrations would go up by July 6 — the day before an expected budget vote — on YouTube and member Web sites of the state’s Coalition for Healthy Communities.

[Photo courtesy of Flickr user glass_window]