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The Department of Justice is suing South Carolina over the living conditions of patients with mental health needs, alleging the state is violating their civil rights. Gov. Henry McMaster called it "political lawfare" from the outgoing Biden administration, but acknowledged change is needed.
Advocates say the state better take it seriously. The federal government claims in its lawsuit that the state is failing to live up to the Americans with Disabilities Act and is violating standards set by the federal Olmstead decision that require states to support people with mental health and special needs in living in the least-restrictive setting. "People with disabilities in South Carolina can and must be able to receive services in their own homes, rather than being isolated in institutions,” said Kristen Clarke, assistant attorney general in the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department.
Charleston center addressing state's mental health, one call at a time The lawsuit follows a withering report last year from a DOJ investigation that found people with mental health issues were often kept in group homes or similar residences with little interaction with the community and not much control over their lives. One resident in the report referred to his home as "a little asylum." The Justice Department contends there are over 1,000 patients in South Carolina in these settings.
The state and the Justice Department have been in negotiations over improvements to the system, but those talks have not borne fruit, said Anna Maria Conner, a senior attorney with Disability Rights South Carolina . The group filed a complaint with the federal government in February 2021 that led to the investigation. McMaster called the timing of the lawsuit suspicious.
"This lame-duck DOJ, which has a track record of political lawfare, chose to race to the courthouse in the waning days of the Biden Administration rather than acknowledging state agency leaders' responsive, collaborative communications," he said in a statement. McMaster did acknowledge the state has a "fractured" system in need of restructuring. He plans to address that in his State of the State address next month, suggesting the state Department of Mental Health and the Department of Disabilities and Special Needs become new cabinet-level agencies.
Cooperation is often a problem with those agencies because many of those patients will have a dual diagnosis and are in need of both mental health and disability services, Conner said. ‘Like a little asylum’: Federal lawsuit looms over SC warehousing mentally ill "It makes it hard to get services," she said. "The agencies fight over who is going to be responsible" for serving those patients.
The S.C. Department of Mental Health does not comment on pending litigation, spokesperson Tracy LaPointe said.
The agency does plan to ask for an additional $3 million in its upcoming budget request to expand services to assist patients with community-based independent living. It's not that the group homes, which are referred to as community residential care facilities, are bad, Conner said. They can be an appropriate intermediate step for a mental health patient leaving a state hospital, for instance.
But then patients can't find support to live independently in the community because there is a lack of services out there, she said. The patients, many of whom are low-income, are among those who suffer from a lack of affordable housing in the state, Conner said. So once they are in the group home, they are stuck, she said.
"It's almost impossible to get out once you're there," Conner said. With few doctors to meet mental health needs, SC expansion and other providers fill gaps South Carolina joins a long list of states who have been sued by the Justice Department over its conditions for mental health and special needs patients, and their lack of community supports. That includes neighboring North Carolina, Georgia and Florida.
Those states have spent a decade or more in some cases — and tens of millions of dollars — in trying to reach compliance. "Every state has to take a Department of Justice lawsuit seriously," Conner said..
