Two new bills would overhaul what advocates say is a broken mental health system, and attempt to address people left to languish on California streets.
A state senator is attempting to make it easier to force people into treatment when they are incapable of caring for themselves, the latest in a series of reforms intended to move Californians with severe mental illnesses off the streets.
The bills would revamp a statewide program through which courts appoint a conservator to control a patient’s medication and treatment. Patients in the program are generally confined to a residential psychiatric facility. They still face opposition from civil rights groups that argue the state should not be expanding programs that strip people of their autonomy.
Senate Bill 43 would expand who qualifies both for a long-term conservatorship and for a short-term, involuntary stay in a psychiatric hospital. To be eligible for that type of intervention, someone must be “gravely disabled” — defined since 1967 to mean the patient is unable to provide for their food, clothing and shelter. The new legislation would broaden that definition to include, among other qualifications, the inability to seek medical care and keep themselves safe.
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