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PUBLIC TESTIMONY
Testimony by Bridget Callahan, Vice President of Intensive Mobile Treatment Programs at Institute of Community Living
4:55:13
·
113 sec
Bridget Callahan from the Institute of Community Living (ICL) testifies on the urgent need to address the mental health crisis in New York City. She emphasizes the effectiveness of ICL's STEPS and IMT programs in supporting individuals with serious mental health challenges and reducing hospitalizations and incarceration rates.
- Callahan highlights the success of the STEPS program, which reduced the waitlist for ACT and IMT programs while maintaining high rates of stable housing and medication adherence among participants.
- She urges the city council to approve a budget that includes expansions for IMT and STEPS programs to help an estimated 1,500 to 2,000 people in need of higher-level support.
- Callahan emphasizes that these programs not only improve individual lives but also strengthen and make communities safer.
Bridget Callahan
4:55:13
Good afternoon chairs and members of the city council.
4:55:15
My name is Bridget Callahan.
4:55:16
I'm the vice president of intensive mobile treatment programs at the Institute of Community Living, more commonly known as ICL.
4:55:22
I'm here to testify on the record that we can solve the most urgent mental health crisis on our streets right now.
4:55:28
It's what New Yorkers want, and it's what people deserve.
4:55:34
We see the commitment to make it happen.
4:55:36
The council's proposed budget includes critical funding to expand steps.
4:55:40
And the mayor's executive budget outlines a vast expansion of intensive mobile treatment teams.
4:55:45
These are just the kind of investments that will help us end this crisis.
4:55:48
As mentioned, I worked for ICL.
4:55:50
For forty years, ICL has supported New Yorkers with the most serious mental health challenges and the deepest histories of trauma, people too often overlooked and underserved.
4:55:58
We have developed a track record for delivering great service and helping people achieve great outcomes.
4:56:02
We know what works.
4:56:03
We developed the innovative STEPS program to build out the continuum of care and give people getting the highest level of intervention through INT programs, a program to transition to as they build independence.
4:56:15
In its first pilot year, STEPS reduced the wait list for ICL's ACT and IMT programs by five percent while ensuring that one hundred percent of participants maintain stable housing, ninety nine percent avoid hospitalizations, ninety eight percent remained adherent to their medication, and zero percent had contact with the criminal justice system.
4:56:33
Our IMT teams show the same results.
4:56:35
Clients overwhelmingly remain housed and avoid hospitalization and incarceration.
4:56:41
These aren't just numbers.
4:56:42
They represent people reclaiming their lives and communities made stronger and safer.
4:56:46
There are only an estimated fifteen hundred to two thousand people in need of higher level of support.
4:56:51
Expanding IMT and STEPPS can help us get to many of them.
4:56:54
The path forward is clear.
4:56:56
What we need now is the will to keep going.
4:56:59
We hope that you will approve a budget with the IMT and STEPPS expansions needed.
4:57:03
Thank you for leading the way.
4:57:04
Let's finish what we started.
4:57:06
Good