Mental health funding takes center stage, but for different reasons in Texas, Victoria – Victoria Advocate
Gov. Greg Abbott and state lawmakers have made a point to focus funding and resources on mental health care, so much so they’re willing to spend over $100 million as a way to bolster school safety following the Uvalde massacre, with a portion of that going to helping troubled souls.
Their idea is mental health is the final trigger that could push someone to use military-grade weapons in mass shootings like the May massacre at Robb Elementary, where the lives of 19 children and two teachers were brutally taken. Sure, it’s a deflection from any significant form of gun control, yet there is some merit to the notion. The point is, the state is putting its money where its collective mouth is: With funding for more school protections, including mental health care, about $10 million more.
If you’re not going to do anything about gun control, and, clearly, Texas is not, this isn’t a bad start.
The mental health funding, just about 10% of the total allocation that’s mostly coming from surplus education funding, uses about $5.8 million to provide more telemedicine and another $4.7 million to boost treatments for at-risk youths, much like the Robb Elementary killer.
Abbott boasted last month how “Texas is acting swiftly to ensure our schools are secure and that children, teachers, and families across Texas have the support and resources they need to be safe as we work to prevent future tragedies like the heinous crime committed in Uvalde.”
He is heading in the right direction, even if on the wrong path to get there.
Cut to Victoria.
Despite national and state GOP moves to boost mental health funding, the county judge here cut money from a group dedicated to mental health care for all — from minorities and marginalized communities to average, middle-class residents.
The petulant cut of $500 was intended as a slap on the wrist of the Be Well Victoria Coalition, whose funding is actually provided by the Hogg Foundation, a nonprofit mental health organization. The funds are merely administered by Victoria County. No county funding is used for this, or any other expenditure of the Be Well Victoria Coalition.
The action was taken because Be Well Victoria paid $500 to be part of an LGBTQ Pride event this weekend. Remember, members of the gay community, especially gay youths and trans youths, make up a disproportionate percentage of attempted and successful suicides. Mental health care is vital to this community.
The money withdrawn by the county was quickly replaced by a kind donor.
A UCLA Law School Williams Institute study found about 93,000 Texans identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or queer. If that population were a city, it would be the fifth-largest in Texas, just behind Austin and ahead of El Paso. For our part, census data shows likely same-sex couples in Victoria County amount to a smaller percentage than the state as a whole. Statewide, the LGBTQ population adds up to 3.2% of the overall 28 million residents. Here, 0.4% of the population identify as lesbian and 0.2% of the overall Victoria County population identify as gay men.
County Judge Ben Zeller clearly sees an LGBTQ Pride event in downtown Victoria as a bad thing, not the “family friendly” activity planners had hoped.
“From my perspective, promoting drag shows in DeLeon Plaza is not an appropriate function of county government,” Zeller told the Advocate.
First, all gay people are not “drag show” participants. Saturday’s LGBTQ Pride event will have a drag show, but at night after children in theory are no longer running around the park playing.
Organizer Flora Hernandez said she had tried to reach out to Zeller but never received a response after the judge cut the grant funding. The county judge likewise never responded to a reporter calling to ask Zeller about Be Well Victoria’s concerns with how the county is spending the group’s money donated by the Hogg Foundation for Mental Health.
Let’s hope the county can live up to the state’s level of concern over mental health and not slink into the vitriol too common in this era of politics. We’ll see this weekend. As always, drop a note to your commissioner if you’re dissatisfied.