ASSEMBLY COMMUNITY SERVICES COMMITTEE

STATEMENT TO

ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE SUBSTITUTE FOR

ASSEMBLY, No. 2180

STATE OF NEW JERSEY

DATED: MARCH 3, 1997

      The Assembly Community Services Committee favorably reports an Assembly Committee Substitute for Assembly Bill No. 2180.

      This committee substitute is intended to facilitate the redirection of State mental health and developmental disability services funding from institutional settings to community-based programs by ensuring an orderly and deliberative approach to the downsizing of State psychiatric hospitals and developmental centers.

      The committee substitute requires the Commissioner of Human Services to:

      a. take such actions as are necessary to ensure that when a mental health facility closes that all funds be redirected to services in the community or other institution thereby increasing the State's financial support to community and institutional mental health services for its citizens.

      b. develop a plan to ensure distribution of funding between community and institutional programs which is adequate to meet the needs of those discharged to community programs or transferred to other State facilities.

      c. ensure that when individuals with a developmental disability move into the community from a developmental center affected by a significant service reduction, funding utilized for the individual in the developmental center shall be used to fund the individual's community placement.

      The committee substitute also provides that any funding from the developmental center placement not needed to fully fund the community placement for that individual shall be directed toward the reduction of the waiting list for services in the Division of Developmental Disabilities in the department. Additionally, the substitute provides that all monies received by the State from the sale of facility property shall be earmarked exclusively for capital and equipment costs associated with the development of community placement for persons with serious mental illness or developmental disabilities, according to criteria to be established by the Commissioner.