Gov. Ron DeSantis signed two mental health-related bills into law Wednesday with the goal of improving mental health care throughout the state.
One (SB 1620) will require the Florida Department of Education to review how telehealth might be used to increase access to school-based mental health services in underserved and rural schools.
The review must assess any challenges districts might face when adopting telehealth and provide recommendations for implementing telehealth in schools.
During a news conference in Tampa, DeSantis said that making sure all kids have access to the care they need changes the game when it comes to mental health outcomes.
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"This helps build a system to try to prevent the worst crises from occurring in the first place. And a lot of times when you have really serious crises, there's a buildup to that, that if you did have some support earlier on, probably could have been avoided," said DeSantis.
The governor also signed into law the Tristin Murphy Act, which will streamline the process of getting nonviolent offenders with serious mental illnesses the mental health treatment they need.
The law (SB 168) is named after Murphy, a 37-year-old Floridian who died by suicide while in a Florida prison. Murphy had schizophrenia and was denied mental health treatment and medication in the weeks leading up to his death.
DeSantis said sometimes the best course of response is treatment, not incarceration, especially when mental illness is a factor.
"So under this bill, counties and municipalities are going to be able to establish misdemeanor mental health programs as well as pretrial felony programs so that if people are in the justice system, and they have these really, particularly, really significant mental health afflictions, that we don't think that somehow just putting them in jail is going to fix those problems," said DeSantis.
Evaluations before prison work assignments
The law requires the Florida Department of Corrections to evaluate the physical and mental health of each inmate eligible for work assignments before approving eligibility. It also allows people to be screened within 24 hours of being detained by law enforcement for a crime so they can be diverted to mental health care if needed instead of prison.
“We talk about a lot of issues in Tallahassee, but mental health is a messy issue. It's a difficult issue, and it's an issue that oftentimes is hard to move the ball meaningfully because it takes a lot of resources,” said Sen. Jennifer Bradley, R-Fleming Island, the bill’s sponsor.
Other elements of the bill, like a provision for more training on when to send mental health units instead of police, will help connect people and their families with resources sooner, she said.
“It's not just the person with the mental illness, it's the family behind them that struggles to get them the resources to try to keep them out of the deep end of the criminal justice system, which is exactly what happened to Tristan Murphy, with tragic consequences,” Bradley said.
The bill also establishes the Florida Behavioral Health Data Repository at Florida State University. It is meant to collect and analyze statewide behavioral health care data in the state to help improve care.
The governor also announced the creation of the Sen. Darryl E. Rouson Center for Substance Abuse and Mental Health Research at the University of South Florida.
The center is named after state Sen. Darryl Rouson, who overcame his own addiction and has campaigned for better services for others struggling with addiction. It will identify best practices for the treatment of substance use disorder and mental illnesses.
Florida's mental illness epidemic
In its latest "State of Florida Behavioral Health Gap Analysis Report," the Florida Department of Children and Families found that 400,000 children and youth struggled with emotional, behavioral and developmental issues in the last year.
Almost 35% of young people in the state had contemplated suicide in the last 12 months.
Overall, 5% of the state's civilian population were identified as having a serious mental illness, and 15% struggled with substance use disorder in the last year.
Despite these challenges, 98.5% of Florida counties had a shortage or complete lack of mental health care providers in the community, which is why school and criminal justice based-mental health services are so crucial.
Despite this need for care, Floridians are among the nation's least frequent users of the 988 Lifeline number according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Read the DCF's full report on the state's outlook on mental health here:
Information from WFSU's Tristin Wood was used in this report.
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