Proposal - Fight closure of half city's mental health clinic

[MentalHealthMovement]

The Mental Health Movement was born out of the successful 2009 struggle to stop Mayor Daley from closing four south side mental health clinics. That campaign culminated in a sit-in at Mayor Daley's office that won us a reprieve from the closures. Ever since we have continued building our base and building a bottom-up movement of consumers of mental health services fighting the constant cutbacks and threats of closure and privatization. Now this struggle has come to a head with Mayor Emanuel's proposal to close 6 of our city's 12 mental health clinics and privatize all 7 Neighborhood Health Centers. This is a death sentence for some of our city's most marginalized and we will not allow our voice to be silenced or our lives to be taken by the cold political calculations and greed of Rahm Emanuel, mayor for the 1%.

We propose that Occupy Chicago join with the Mental Health Movement and endorse as well as promote our People's Budget Assembly on Tuesday November 15th at 12noon at the Chicago Temple at 77 W. Washington, where we will meet to take our final stand the day before City Council votes on a budget that could shutter half our mental health clinics and privatize all of our neighborhood health centers.

[Paulhaider74]

I wish that I could be there for the protest, but I have to work be at work on that same day. I worked for three years as the only mental health clinician at Chicago Family Health Center in the South Chicago neighborhood (91st Street and South Exchange). There was a steady decline in funding from the state due to budget cuts, and my department would have been eliminated if it hadn't been for the federal funding. Pleae keep up this good fight for mental health!
Paul Haider, Chicago