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Mental Illness

Monday, February 25, 2013

Local EMS, Mental Health Services Respond to Potential Sequestration

Should Congress not act by March 1, a series of automatic cuts will take effect that affect thousands of middle class jobs, and cut vital services for children, seniors, people with mental illness and our men and women in uniform

If the sequester goes through on March 1, it could mean massive cuts to emergency services, mental health services, school funding, senior citizen services and more. Locally, the various National Alliance on Mental Illness programs continue to advocate for change before March 1. If sequestration goes into effect, more than 373,000 mentally ill adults and children could go untreated. The result could be homelessness, increased crime and increased hospitalizations. Carol Caruso, executive director of NAMI Montgomery County, said mental health and substance abuse programs could be cut by about 5 percent. Tack that onto the 10 percent cut that occurred in the Pennsylvania budget. "There is more slicing away at services in that area that are …

Jim Roberts

5:10 pm on Monday, February 25, 2013

Amazing that a 2% cut in the federal budget will have such an impact. I guess the government is so efficient already, there really isn't any fat to trim after all, eh?   more ›

Wednesday, February 13, 2013

Lawyer: 45-Year History of Mental Illness for Man in Lansdale Matricide

Warren Pennick, 54, is accused of pushing his 74-year-old mother, Lorraine Pennick, down the basement stairs and cutting her throat on Halloween in their Salford Avenue home. Pennick is competent to stand trial, the Commonwealth said

Warren Pennick, 54, of 635 Salford Avenue, Lansdale, the man accused by police of murdering his mother on Halloween, had charges of felony first- and third-degree murder held for March arraignment in Montgomery County Court of Common Pleas at a Skippack preliminary hearing Wednesday morning. Pennick allegedly pushed his mother, Lorraine Pennick, 74, down their basement stairs and then slit her throat, for fear of her becoming "homeless" due to their inability to pay for repairs for the home, police said. According to his attorney, Pennick has suffered with mental illnesses for 45 years, specifically paranoid schizophrenia. Clad in a red jumpsuit and donning a long, bushy white beard, Pennick shuffled into the courtroom of Judge Albert …

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

MCCC Has the POWER

The college recently received a grant to develop a work enrichment program for students with mental illness.

A Montgomery County Community College program aimed at empowering students diagnosed with mental illness was recharged by a recent grant from the van Ameringen Foundation. According to an MCCC press release, the foundation, based in New York, recently awarded Montgomery County Community College a $100,000 grant toward the development of the Partnership On Work Enrichment and Readiness for Transitional Age Youth (POWER TAY) program. The POWER program, originally funded by the Montgomery County Mental Health Administration and the college, has been in existence since spring 2006; since then, 200 students who have diagnosable mental illnesses that have led to functional impairments in education and work have participated in the program, said …

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