New York City Mayor Eric Adams has announced a new initiative that would allow authorities to more aggressively intervene to help people in need of mental health treatment.
FILE - Homeless Outreach personnel reach out to a person sleeping on a bench in the Manhattan subway system, Monday, Feb. 21, 2022, in New York. In New York City's latest effort to address a mental health crisis on its streets and subways, Mayor Eric Adams announced Tuesday, Nov. 29, that authorities would more aggressively intervene to help people in need of treatment, saying there was"a moral obligation" to do so, even if it means providing care to those who don't ask for it.
State law generally limits the ability of authorities to force someone into treatment unless they are a danger to themselves, but Adams said it was a “myth” that the law required a person to be behaving in an “outrageously dangerous” or suicidal way before a police officer or medical worker could take action.
“The Mayor is playing fast and loose with the legal rights of New Yorkers and is not dedicating the resources necessary to address the mental health crises that affect our communities," said Donna Lieberman, executive director the New York Civil Liberties Union. “Mayor Adams continues to get it wrong when it comes to his reliance on ineffective surveillance, policing, and involuntary transport and treatment of people with mental illness," said the coalition's executive director, Jacquelyn Simone.
“We need fixes within the criminal legal system so that those people who do end up arrested can find a way out with treatment and support in the community and a road to real recovery and not jail,” he said. Adams has called for an expansion of the use of 1999's “Kendra’s Law,” which allows courts to order defendants with mental illness to complete treatment.
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