Quote Originally Posted by RYANGUARD View Post
This is not a problem that just happened.When I started at Cass tech in 1971 there were always people panhandling down there.But then again there were cheap places to stay in the Cass Corridor at $5 a night hotels.There were mental health treatment facilities that they could go to,for example Northville,Ypsi State Hospital,Eloise,Herman Kiefer,Lafayette Clinic.Now,without the safety net that these facilities provided,we have a problem.The biggest problem is who would pay for these types of places again.Instead,for the most part,the jails and prisons handle these types of people that are on the fringe of our society.So rather than send some of these people to a state run mental health institution when they need an intervention,they get sent to the Wayne County Jail or a Michigan State Prison.There were safe places for the majority of these people to go to but now the State sends X amount of dollars to each county to use for mental health programs.No more big institutions so now we have more "street" people....
I've always heard that Governor Engler was responsible for closing many of the mental health facilities that the state operated? Can anyone back this up?