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Opinion | An example of bipartisanship our lawmakers should follow
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As we await a state budget from our divided government, a successful program helping communities statewide could serve as an inspiration of bipartisanship at a time when Michigan needs it most.
It has a name not many know: Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinics. Or, CCBHCs. Yes, that is a mouthful either way. But it is also a new model of service delivery that is working here and elsewhere in the country, and for that, everyone red and everyone blue should be able to take credit.
Simply put, CCBHCs provide mental health and related services, following rigorous national standards, to members of communities that otherwise would not be able to afford that kind of care. A first round of pilot programs began in eight states in 2014, as part of a bill co-sponsored by Michigan Senator Debbie Stabenow, a Democrat, and Missouri Senator Roy Blount, a Republican. Here in Michigan, we joined the pilot program in 2021. Today, CCBHCs do important and effective work in “purple” states like ours and also in “red” states like Texas and “blue” states like New York.
The Michigan data about this proves that a bipartisan program can serve communities without either side having to give up anything. They both just have to agree on the fact that it works. CCBHCs improve access to behavioral health services. In Michigan, between 2023 and 2024, as the model took hold in more places, 17% more adults and children received services statewide, now totaling nearly 120,000 people across Michigan. Of that total, 76% had Medicaid and 7% had no insurance. Importantly, this model helped more than 71% more Michigan residents with mild to moderate mental illness receive care, including same day access, school-based services and expanded services for people with substance use disorders.
In addition to establishing payment and treatment models proven effective over a decade nationally, with now more than 500 sites across the country, CCBHCs also have helped improve collaboration between the nonprofit sector and law enforcement. In Michigan alone, CCBHCs have referred thousands of court-involved individuals to behavioral health services, rather than keeping them in the judicial or prison systems, via law enforcement and the use of specialty courts like drug, mental health and veterans’ courts.
Police leaders tell us that these programs help provide improved response for mental health situations. “It allows our officers to know that they are not out there alone,” said John Allen, Riverview’s Police Chief, speaking of the Mental Health Rapid Response Program, funded through a CCHBC. “It provides our officers with more tools to do their jobs safely and efficiently. It definitely reduces people who are suffering a mental crisis from going to jail and can ensure they obtain the mental health services they need.”
Brownstown Township Deputy Chief of Police Andrew Starcez added that a frequent caller to their department’s dispatch over more than four years, who would call up to ten times per week with hallucinations, was provided resources through a CCBHC program in April and has not called for police aid since.
Quality, accessible mental health care for adults and children who otherwise would not be able to afford it sounds like it is too good to be true. So does bipartisan policymaking. But, the CCBHC model proves that both are possible. Everyone now working in Lansing should know about that, remember it, act on it and then share the credit.
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