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Chicago Sun Feb 08 2009
STOP: Stop Closing Mental Health Clinics
Why is the city closing down mental health clinics on the South Side?
Displacement? Gentrification? Making parts of the city superficially pretty for the International Olympic Committee?
My tendency is to think "all of the above" or, maybe, "six of one, half dozen of the other."
Southside Together Organizing for Power, a community group that does just what its name implies, came to that same conclusion when they began fighting the closures last year. Closing mental health clinics is a common way to attack a community's social safety net. Having grown up in and around Chicago, I remember the stories of the closures of mental health facilities in Uptown that led to an increase in homelessness for the most at-risk.
But more than that, it's just cruel. Providing this kind of health care benefits communities; it doesn't drain them. STOP intends to take that message directly to the Mayor on Tuesday, at 10am, at his City Hall office.
