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F I S C A L I M P A C T R E P O R T

SPONSOR Nava

ORIGINAL DATE

LAST UPDATED

02/13/07

HB

SHORT TITLE

Needs of Certain Mentally Ill Adolescents

SB 569

ANALYST Hanika Ortiz

APPROPRIATION (dollars in thousands)

Appropriation

Recurring

or Non-Rec

Fund

Affected

FY07

FY08

$250.0

recurring

general fund

(Parenthesis ( ) Indicate Expenditure Decreases)

SOURCES OF INFORMATION

LFC Files

Responses Received From

Department of Health (DOH)

SUMMARY

Synopsis of Bill

Senate Bill 569 appropriates $250 thousand from the General Fund to DOH for expenditure in

FY07 and FY08 to pay for planning support to address the needs of severely mentally ill

adolescents in the third judicial district.

FISCAL IMPLICATIONS

The appropriation of $250 thousand contained in this bill is a recurring expense to the general

fund. Any unexpended or unencumbered balance remaining at the end of FY08 shall revert to the

general fund.

The appropriation of $250 thousand to DOH is not included in the Executive Budget Request for

FY08.

SIGNIFICANT ISSUES

DOH reports that southern New Mexico currently lacks sufficient psychiatric services for

severely mentally ill adolescents and the population continues to increase. The population of

Doña Ana County alone increased by nearly 10,000 people, or about 5%, from 2000 to 2005.

Senate Bill 569 – Page

2

There are no publicly funded inpatient mental health services for adolescents in southern New

Mexico, requiring residents to travel 225 miles to Sequoyah Adolescent Treatment Center in

Albuquerque. This is an issue that impedes access and continuity of care, as well as creating

undue hardship for families.

PERFORMANCE IMPLICATIONS

Children Youth and Families Division (CYFD) is responsible for child and adolescent mental

health, so it may be more appropriate to appropriate the money to CYFD.

TECHNICAL ISSUES

There should be an emergency clause for any expenditure request in the bill for FY07.

OTHER SUBSTANTIVE ISSUES

The adolescents served by this bill can be experiencing symptoms of a mental illness such as

hearing voices, delusional beliefs, unusual and unsubstantiated fears, illogical and/or fragmented

thinking, significant depression and/or suicidal thoughts and behaviors, intense anxiety or

extreme elation. Their thinking is so disordered that they have substantially lost touch with

reality. There is usually a high degree of dysfunctional behavior associated with these symptoms,

i.e., loss of employment, inability to carry out normal activities of daily living, major family

discord, etc.

Another major category of this crisis population is that of severe mental disorders. These are

people who are not severely mentally ill. They are usually suicidal or experiencing a major

emotional crisis that has temporarily disabled their ability to cope. Anyone can experience a

severe mental disorder under the right combination of stress, severe loss or lack of support.

Many have underlining personality disorders. A personality disorder is defined in the DSM-III-

R), "as traits that are characteristic of the person's recent and long term functioning. The

constellation of behaviors or traits causes either significant impairment in social or occupational

functioning or internal, subjective distress." These people have long standing characteristics that

were developed mostly to cope with life. The characteristics developed are maladaptive and

extremely hard to change.

WHAT WILL BE THE CONSEQUENCES OF NOT ENACTING THIS BILL

Funding in the amount of $250,000 will not be appropriated to DOH for planning support to

address the needs of severely mentally ill adolescents in the third judicial district.

AMENDMENTS

Page 1, line 20, delete “severely mentally ill adolescents" and replace with “adolescents with

severe mental illness or severe mental disorders".

AHO/csd