| Child's health focus of free community talks |
Kennebec Behavioral Health is pleased to present several free educational programs in the coming weeks, all of them related to Children's Mental Health Awareness Week, which is May 6-12.
The talks, part of the agency's 2012 Community Learning Series, are sponsored by the Bank of Maine.
The upcoming presentations are as follows:
Caring for Our Kids: Understanding Youth Suicide: When: 5:30-6:30 p.m. May 7. Where: Warsaw Middle School library, 167 School St., Pittsfield.Presenter: Rob Rogers, LADC, KBH.
Students & Substance Abuse: When: 6-7 p.m. May 8. Where: Madison Area Junior High School cafeteria, 205 Main St., Madison. Presenter: Rob Rogers, LADC, KBH.
Positive Solutions to Negative Behaviors at Home: When: 6-7 p.m. May 9.
Where: Vassalboro Community School cafeteria, 1116 Webber Pond Rd., Vassalboro. Presenter: Michelle Shaw, LCSW, KBH.
Is It ADHD or Just Inattention?: When: 5:30-6:30 p.m. May 9. Where: Albert S. Hall School cafeteria, 27 Pleasant St., Waterville. Presenter: Dr. Janine Taylor, M.D., KBH.
KBH is grateful for the Bank of Maine's support in promoting this informative series throughout central Maine.
|
|
| Teens create April 14 screenplay on depression |
On April 14, KBH will present "The Road Back," a screenplay on teen depression to air on WABI-TV from 7-8 p.m. and on The CW channel from April 22 from 10-11 a.m.
The screenplay was written by Hermon High School sophomore Faith Bishop, who focuses on two students dealing with depression during their senior year. Students from Hermon, Bangor, Old Town, Hampden and Brewer participated in the film, which was brought to life by Project Aware, a Maine non-profit organization devoted to giving young people a safe space up to speak about sensitive subjects.
KBH is one of the TV show's four underwriters.
Beyond the TV broadcasts, the film is available free to see by local middle and high schools. For details about screening the film in your school, call Project Aware at 282-5598.
|
|
| Lester T. Jolovitz, 1917-2012 |
Lester T. Jolovitz, who helped co-found our agency in 1960, died Feb. 29 in Naples, Fla.
A longtime supporter of Kennebec Behavioral Health programs, Mr. Jolovitz served as president of the agency's governing board from 1964-1965.
He was born in Winslow in 1917. He graduated from Colby College in 1939 and Boston University School of Law in 1942. He spent 1942-1945 in the European theater in the medical corps.
Mr. Jolovitz practiced law in Waterville, Maine, for 46 years, including 16 years as associate judge of the Waterville Municipal Court and was past president of the Kennebec Bar Association. He retired in 1990.
His involvements in Waterville organizations included serving as president of the Chamber of Commerce, as one of the incorporators of the Waterville Area Development Corporation and as director of Federal Trust (later Merrill Bank, then Fleet Bank). He was a director of the Holocaust and Human Rights Center in Augusta, Maine. He was very active with the Alfond Youth Center, having served as president of the center's Heritage Circle, which supports the Alfond Center's Camp Tracy.
He is survived by his wife, Barbara; his brother, Alvin; his daughter, Leslie (Rand) Edwards; stepson Karl Rogers; and stepdaughter Deborah; five grandsons; and four great-grandchildren; as well as his nephew, James Sandler; niece Elaine Sandler; and several cousins.
|
|
| Events keyed to child-abuse awareness month |
April is National Child Abuse and Neglect Prevention Awareness Month. Child abuse occurs at every
socioeconomic level, across ethnic and cultural lines, within all religions and at all levels of education. It can cause traumatic psychological, emotional and physical harm that can lead to detrimental behaviors and mental and physical illnesses as children and into adulthood.
We can help by understanding the devastating problem of child abuse and neglect, and the need for all to help families
overcome and protect our most valuable asset - our children.
In Waterville, KVCAP's Family Enrichment Council will host two events to highlight abuse awareness, including the "Trooper & Community Partner Recognition" event on March 26. KVCAP, KBH, community and law-enforcement partners and Waterville's School Resource Officer, Todd Burbank, will take part.
A second event is the "Lights for Child Abuse and Neglect Prevention Awareness Month." This will take place at 5:30 p.m. April 4 in Waterville's Castonguay Square. After a City proclamation related to child abse is read, all participating Main Street businesses will turn on blue lights displayed in their storefront windows in solidarity. For details, call Deb Rich, 207-859-1580.
Just as there are various types of abuse and neglect, the symptoms of abuse and neglect may vary from child to child. Child Welfare Information Gateway, a service of the feberal Children's Bureau, has a helpful website section, Identification of Child Abuse and Neglect (http://www.childwelfare.gov/can/identifying/), that provides links to information and resources on the signs or common indicators of the various types of abuse and neglect. Specifically, the following factsheets may be of interest to you:
Recognizing Child Abuse and Neglect: Signs and Symptoms
http://www.childwelfare.gov/pubs/factsheets/signs.cfm
http://www.childwelfare.gov/pubs/factsheets/signs.pdf
If you suspect that a child is being harmed, you should report your concerns to the appropriate authorities, such as Child Protective Services(CPS). Maine, and each state across the nation, has trained professionals who can evaluate the situation and determine whether intervention or services are needed. Many states have a toll-free number to call to report suspected child abuse or neglect. Please refer to the related organizations listing at: http://www.childwelfare.gov/pubs/reslist/rl_dsp.cfm?rs_id=5&rate_chno=W-00082 for information about where to call to make a report in your State.
Another resource for information about how and where to file a report is the Childhelp® National Child Abuse Hotline. Childhelp can be reached 24-hours a day, 7 days a week at its toll-free number, 1.800.4 A-CHILD (1-800-422-4453).
For comprehensive information about child abuse and neglect, visit the website of Child Welfare Information Gateway at: http://www.childwelfare.gov/can/.
To report child abuse or neglect:
Call 1-800-452-1999
Deaf/Hard of Hearing - TTY: 1-800-963-9490
The Maine Child and Family Services line is staffed 24-hours a day, 7-days a week.
|
|
|
| Agencies merge to improve access to care |
Kennebec Behavioral Health and Youth & Family Services Inc. have merged the non-profit agencies, programs and workforces to provide expanded and coordinated health-care options in central Maine.
The combined agencies are known as Kennebec Behavioral Health. About 35 Y&FS employees became part of the KBH staff in the merger, during the first week of February. Patient care was uninterrupted during the transition. KBH now has about 350 employees.
"Youth & Family Services has long been a vital member of the mental health community providing services primarily in Somerset County," said Thomas J. McAdam, chief executive officer of Kennebec Behavioral Health.
"We believe that a merger of KBH services and Youth & Family services will help both organizations provide coordinated and effective care, and expand access to services in Somerset County."
Lora Wilford-McManus, director of the Skowhegan-based Y&FS, said the merger was "a natural fit, especially in these difficult financial times to provide quality services to clients and their families, and to save taxpayer dollars at the same time."
She said the two agencies have worked collaboratively for 20 years to meet the needs of behavioral health clients in Somerset and Kennebec counties.
The merger was carefully measured in light of a struggling economy and proposed changes to the state's MaineCare program.
"Both agencies feel that clients' interests are paramount. They will experience no inconvenience. The merger will see to that. It will be truly seamless," said Cass Hirschfelt, Y&FS Board President and CEO of the Franklin-Somerset Federal Credit Union.
Hirschfelt called KBH an "excellent dance partner" for the merger. "KBH has an unblemished record and its providers have a very good rapport with the communities it serves."
United Way of Mid-Maine Director Tina Chapman said the two agencies "have demonstrated distinct yet complimentary expertise in the provision of quality behavioral health services in our region. Together, they will create a superbly dynamic, effective organization providing critical services to our neighbors, friends and family members."
William Primmerman, Project Director for the Greater Somerset Public Health Collaborative, called the merger "a real blessing in that it potentially will address the need for increased behavioral health resources in Somerset County."
Y&FS providers have about 1,000 clients. Last year, KBH saw more than 12,500 clients in seven counties, most of them residents of Kennebec and Somerset counties.
Before the merger, KBH operated 30 programs; Y&FS operated nine including two that, until the merger, had not been offered by KBH: case management for developmentally delayed adults; and Halcyon House emergency shelter for youth. These services will continue under the auspices of KBH.
KBH by September will permanently relocate its Skowhegan clinic staff from KBH's leased space at 30 High St., into the larger building that Y&FS has been using at 5 Commerce Drive, Skowhegan. KBH has purchased that property as well as the youth shelter and the Y&FS building in Augusta, at 72 Winthrop St., which is nearby a KBH facility on Winthrop Street.
KBH recently was awarded its third consecutive three-year approval from CARF International for all services and programs. The thee-year approval is CARF's highest accreditation.
KBH partners with more than 80 advisory organizations, policy-action groups, family advocacy councils, standard-setting organizations, community and academic and provider groups and medical institutions.
The agency has clinics in Augusta and Winthrop, as well as two in Skowhegan and two in Waterville; and vocational clubhouse affiliates in Augusta, Lewiston and Waterville.
To learn about the agencies' combined services and supports, call KBH's Access Line at 888-322-2136 or go online to www.kbhmaine.org. |
|
| KBH offers free presentations on stress, negative behaviors |
 |  |  | | Jacquelyn Austin | Colleen Lachowicz | Michelle Shaw |
Kennebec Behavioral Health's 2012 Community Learning Series includes presentations by School Based providers who will speak about dealing with stress as well as negative behaviors at home.
This ongoing series of talks, free to all, presents clinically sound advice on issues that youths, teens, parents and educators often deal with in their daily lives.
At 6:30 p.m. Feb. 29, School Based Director Colleen Lachowicz, LCSW, and Jacquelyn Austin, LCPC, together will present a talk called "Stress Management for Teens and Adults" at the Winslow High School library, 20 Danielson St., Winslow. For directions to the school, call 872-1990.
Michelle Shaw, LCSW, will present "Positive Solutions to Negative Behaviors at Home," at the Pittston School cafeteria, 1023 School St., Pittston, at 6 p.m. March 28. For directions to the Pittston school, call 582-6268.
In both cases, these KBH providers will have helpful handouts for those who attend. Light refreshments also will be available. For details about Kennebec Behavioral Health's 2012 Community Learning Series, call 873-2136, ext 1905. |
|
| Everything looking up at Looking Ahead Clubhouse |
LEWISTON - Open less than two months, Kennebec Behavioral Health's new Lewiston Clubhouse affiliate, at 646 Main Street, already has had more than 100 referrals and has 91 members.
The Looking Ahead Clubhouse is based on the evidence-based Clubhouse Model of Psychiatric Rehabilitation, which improves the quality of life for clubhouse members who experience mental illness. Clubhouses help members experiencing mental illness overcome barriers to employment by offering them job-development supports, placement, coaching and other services.
The Clubhouse is one of three independent affiliates of KBH, which operates the Capitol Clubhouse in Augusta and the High Hopes Clubhouse in Waterville.
The Looking Ahead Clubhouse is directed by Christine Berry, who previously opened and directed High Hopes and the Capitol clubhouses in Waterville and Augusta, respectively.
"We are providing up to five tours (of the Clubhouse) per day and are completing on an average of at least three referrals per day," said Assistant Director Terrie Kee. Kee had been employment coordinator at both High Hopes and Capitol Clubhouse.
The Clubhouse is being opened with the help of a $150,000 start-up grant from the Department of Health and Human Services. Both DHHS Commissioner Mary Mayhew and Gov. Paul L. LePage have said they've been impressed with the ways that Clubhouse employees help Clubhouse members join the workforce, often for the first time.
"We are extremely pleased and fortunate that our current governor has first-hand experience and understands the importance of our Clubhouses," said Thomas J. McAdam, chief executive officer of KBH.
"As a former Advisory member to our Clubhouse in Waterville, Gov. LePage understands the positive impact of a meaningful job and a paycheck, and supports the efforts of persons experiencing mental illness having access to meaningful employment."
Clubhouse staff welcomes potential club members as well as area businesses who are interesting in becoming transitional-employment sites. For details, call Berry or Kee at 376-1711.
|
|
| Agency's economic value to region |
Kennebec Behavioral Health creates a positive economic impact on central Maine by paying competitive salaries to its 350 employees, by buying goods and services from central Maine businesses and vendors, and by helping thousands of people maintain their jobs through individualized health-care plans.
The agency also provided more than $400,000 in unfunded health care to our neighbors last year.
Since KBH was founded in 1960, it has grown to one of central Maine's largest employers.
KBH operates about 30 community mental health and substance abuse programs that served 13,500 adults and children last year alone.
KBH also contributed more than $15.7 million in salaries and benefits, contributed $1.2 million for health insurance coverage for its employees and purchased more than $5.4 million in goods and services from local Maine businesses.
|
|
| Bob Long led State substance-abuse commission |
As chairman of the State of Maine's Substance Abuse Services Commission, KBH's Bob Long recently served as the chairman of the Workgroup convened through Legislative Document 1501. Long is Administrator of Access, Substance Abuse and Outcome Management at KBH.
Through this legislation, this group of commission members and public and private stakeholders was directed to make recommendations through the State's Joint Standing Committee on Health and Human Service for improvements in how prescribers treat patients in chronic, non-cancer-related pain without causing addiction or diversion.
The Commission specifically was asked to:
review Maine's efforts aimed at preventing addiction and diversion; examine similar efforts in other states, including Washington State;
consider additional tools that could lead to decreased abuse while not unduly restricting access to adequate pain control, and
suggest enhancements to the Controlled Substances Prescription Monitoring Program.
The efforts of the Workgroup resulted in a comprehensive report and 33 "solid recommendations" about how to address rising prescription-drug abuse in Maine, said Rep. Jon Hinck, D-Portland.
Commission Chairman Long and several other LD 1501 Workgroup members presented the recommendations to the Legislature's Health and Human Services Committee in January 2012. During their presentation, legislators on the committee voted unanimously to accept one of the recommendations on the spot and sent a letter to John Morris, Public Safety Commissioner, asking him to set up a Drug Disposal Task Force to look into ways to dispose of expired and unused medications. Several of the Workgroup's other recommendations are being addressed during the current legislative session.
Long has worked in the behavioral health treatment field as a clinician and a director of substance abuse and mental health programs since 1973. In 1995, he came to Kennebec Behavioral Health to assist the agency in establishing its substance-abuse services program.
|
|
| Mental illness - by the numbers |
Recent data from the National Alliance on Mental Illness and the National Council to help you understand mental illness and its effects:
People with serious mental illness - which include schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and major clinical depression - die 25 years earlier than the general population, on average. Sixty percent of premature deaths in people with schizophrenia are due to medical conditions such as cardiovascular, pulmonary and infectious disease. (Unfortunately, people with serious mental illness also suffer from a high prevalence of modifiable risk factors, in particular obesity and tobacco use.)
Mental illnesses are serious medical illnesses. They cannot be overcome through "will power" and are not related to a person's "character" or intelligence. Mental illness falls along a continuum of severity. Even though mental illness is widespread in the population, the main burden of illness is concentrated in a much smaller proportion-about 6 percent, or 1 in 17 Americans-who live with a serious mental illness. The National Institute of Mental Health reports that One in four adults-approximately 57.7 million Americans-experience a mental health disorder in a given year.
The U.S. Surgeon General reports that 10 percent of children and adolescents in the United States suffer from serious emotional and mental disorders that cause significant functional impairment in their day-to-day lives at home, in school and with peers.
The World Health Organization has reported that four of the 10 leading causes of disability in the US and other developed countries are mental disorders. By 2020, Major Depressive illness will be the leading cause of disability in the world for women and children.
Mental illness usually strike individuals in the prime of their lives, often during adolescence and young adulthood. All ages are susceptible, but the young and the old are especially vulnerable.
Without treatment, the consequences of mental illness for the individual and society are staggering: unnecessary disability, unemployment, substance abuse, homelessness, inappropriate incarceration, suicide and wasted lives; The economic cost of untreated mental illness is more than $100 billion each year in the United States.
The best treatments for serious mental illnesses today are highly effective; between 70 and 90 percent of individuals have significant reduction of symptoms and improved quality of life with a combination of pharmacological and psychosocial treatments and supports.
With appropriate effective medication and a wide range of services tailored to their needs, most people who live with serious mental illnesses can significantly reduce the impact of their illness and find a satisfying measure of achievement and independence. A key concept is to develop expertise in developing strategies to manage the illness process.
Early identification and treatment is of vital importance. By ensuring access to the treatment and recovery supports that are proven effective, recovery is accelerated and the further harm related to the course of illness is minimized.
Stigma erodes confidence that mental disorders are real, treatable health conditions. We have allowed stigma and an unwarranted sense of hopelessness to put up attitudinal, structural and financial barriers to effective treatment and recovery. It is time to take these barriers down.
To learn about the programs and services that Kennebec Behavioral Health offers to treat mental disorders, write info@kbhmaine.org, or call 873-2136, ext. 1905.
|
|
| KBH's new Waterville clinic is agency's fifth |
Kennebec Behavioral Health expanded access to health care in central Maine by opening its fifth clinic, and second in Waterville, on the Downtown Concourse in 2011.
The Concourse Clinic offers adult and adolescent psychiatry in the formerly empty space between Inland Family Care, which opened in May 2011, and the Family Dollar Store.
KBH expects to see more than 400 patients at the clinic, said Thomas J. McAdam, the agency's chief executive officer. Up to three KBH providers staff the clinic five days each week, he said. It is being managed by Bridget A. Gray, KBH's Administrator of Medical Services.
KBH is leasing the space from Inland Hospital, which operates Inland Family Care. KBH partners with dozens of community-based organizations that provide behavioral and physical care to area residents.
"We're happy to open a location in the heart of the downtown, where many of our patients live and work," said McAdam. "Our relationship with Inland has become a special one, where the doctors of both offices realize how important integrated care is and will be going forward," he said.
John Dalton, Inland Hospital President and CEO, said the hospital "is proud to collaborate with KBH to improve access to important mental health and substance abuse services. With KBH locating right next door to our new downtown practice, it offers more opportunities for our medical groups to work closer together for the benefit of all our patients."
Kimberly N. Lindlof, director of the Mid-Maine Chamber of Commerce, said the co-location of the clinics seems "only natural. With such a demand for holistic care and mental health services in our region, this seems the perfect synergy."
McAdam said the Concourse Clinic reflects the agency's commitment to the community and is a direct response to the community health-needs assessment conducted by OneMaine Health, a collaboration between Eastern Maine Healthcare Systems, MaineGeneral Health and MaineHealth. The statewide assessment examined health status, use of health services, access and barriers to care, and other factors affecting the health of Maine people.
KBH and Winthrop Family Medicine offer integrated care now, with a KBH staffer and provider working part-time with the Winthrop practice, which is an affiliate of MaineGeneral Health.
KBH was founded as one of the state's original mental health centers in 1960. It also operates clinics at its Waterville headquarters at 67 Eustis Parkway and in its Skowhegan, Winthrop and Augusta locations. KBH also operates two vocational clubhouses - in Waterville and Augusta - and is opening a third clubhouse affiliate in Lewiston this winter
.
KBH provided services and supports to more than 13,500 individuals last year. For information, or to schedule an appointment at any KBH clinic, call 1-888-322-2136. |
|
| James R. "Jim" Schmidt (1927-2011)
|
WATERVILLE - James R. "Jim" Schmidt, one of the world's leading proponents of the clubhouse model for rehabilitation in the mental health field and the international expert in employment for those experiencing mental illness, died Aug. 11, 2011, of pancreatic cancer at the Thayer Campus of MaineGeneral Medical Center, in Waterville.
He died as one of his bedside daughters read the poetry of Walt Whitman to him.
A resident of Rome since 1992, Schmidt was born in the New York City borough of Queens. Schmidt worked at Fountain House for 38 years, beginning in 1954, before retiring as its executive director in 1992. Fountain House created the global model for vocational clubhouses that promote and provide employment for the mentally ill.
Schmidt was a board member of Kennebec Behavioral Health (KBH) for many years.
In 1997, he and the late Mal Wilson helped KBH launch High Hopes Clubhouse in Waterville; Schmidt helped open Augusta's Capitol Clubhouse five years later. Through his advocacy to the Maine Department of Health and Human Services, KBH is able to open a third clubhouse, in Lewiston, in January 2012.
Gov. Paul LePage said Schmidt "was a mentor to me and helped me understand the needs and how we could help. He was persistent and unending in his pursuit to try and find vocational opportunities for people with mental illness."
Ron Welch, Director of the State's Office of Adult Mental Health Services, said Schmidt "had a gift to see beyond the mental illness and find the person. For him, the vehicle for restoring hope and life is work - and that has worked for many, many people."
"Jim Schmidt was one of the most tenacious people I have ever met," said Cheryl L. Davis, KBH Administrator of Outpatient and Community Services. "He was single-minded in his belief that all of us, including those who are mentally ill, have much to offer the world in terms of skills and abilities. We all just need someone to give us a chance."
Schmidt's death was felt beyond the mental health community.
"It's difficult to overstate the importance of Jim Schmidt's contribution to central Maine over the past 15 years," said Waterville City Manager Mike Roy. "He has been a tireless advocate for the rights of mental health clients and a leader in the effort to establish the first clubhouse program in Maine. Largely as a result of his efforts, a substantial number of mental health clients in Maine are now able to work and become more active participants in our society. The people of Maine, not only those in central Maine, owe him a deep debt of gratitude."
Schmidt used every chance he could to speak in behalf of what has become known as "the clubhouse model," including to a group of Maine DHHS officials who visited Capitol Clubhouse in Augusta this past May.
"It's the right time to start another one," Schmidt told them. "We have the expertise. We know it works. Why wouldn't we want to do it right now?"
Schmidt's enthusiasm for the clubhouse model sounded disarmingly fresh, but the 84-year-old Rome resident had been at it for a half century. The Queens native worked at New York City's Fountain House for 38 years before retiring as its executive director in 1992. Fountain House created the global model for vocational clubhouses that promote and provide jobs for the mentally ill.
Schmidt's first social-work job was with the Catholic Guardian Society, where he provided services and supports to New York City's disadvantaged children and orphans. In 1954, he found part-time work at the nearby Fountain House, and there his passion for the clubhouse model was lit.
"It's what I wanted to do," Schmidt recalled in an interview July 20. "I went to work part-time there, at first, because I was going to grad school at Columbia and needed the money to pay for Columbia and other things. I was being paid for 20 hours a week but I was hanging around there and working really 40 hours a week. Columbia wasn't happy with my decision to work there, rather than at a hospital, for example, because nothing much was going on at the House in those days. It was mostly empty in the daytime. Most club members were doing nothing with their time. There were no jobs for them and no prospects for jobs. No one was happy; no one had a solution. Remember, back then, when you left a mental hospital, nothing much happened next. You were on your own. Some people made it, but most people did not make it. It was a huge problem. In New York State alone, 50,000 people with mental illnesses had been living in state hospitals and suddenly they were out in the world. Nationwide, it was half a million."
Schmidt recalled how the Fountain House became the model for vocational rehabilitation.
"In the 1950s, we were a small little band trying to do something. Nationally there began to be some activity, some discussions, among social workers who were trying to address the whole unemployment problem with the mentally ill. A few people like (research psychologist) Victor Goertzel and John Beard, who was the House's first director, were writing about unemployment in the academic journals. Beard was suggesting that people with mental illness should go to work. There was some fervor for it among the Fountain House board. We eventually all got the idea that mental hospitals were no place to live and flourish. The Board wanted to see something happen. But it wasn't a simple solution: As a person with mental illness, how do you move from doing nothing - with no recent experience, hardly any friends, being on medication and experiencing nothing positive - to getting a job and working with people?
" 'Well,' we asked ourselves, 'What are we going to do with these people?' We decided to have the members run the clubhouse and keep it fixed up, to have them make lunches for everyone and to learn to clean up afterwards. Keep in mind these were people who for a long time had kept hearing the word 'no.' So you had to teach them how to behave toward each other so they'd move from 'no' to 'yes.' "
The daily-living skills for many became the path to employment.
Fountain House staff taught club members to get up in timely fashion, greet people at the clubhouse door, learn to prepare food, take care of their building. "The house became ablaze with these kinds of activities," Schmidt said.
"Beard's idea was to find employers for the clubhouse members. So you get staff to learn to do some other kind of job for another employer and then teach that job to a clubhouse member who might want to try it. My first job there doing this was as a printer's foot messenger. My job was to win the employer over by doing the work well. Then I'd take a member with me who I'd train to do that same job. I'd withdraw from doing the work when the club member showed me he could do it. That then would become their job. If something went wrong, I'd step back in and do that job. We eventually had 108 people going to work in 45 different companies. Eventually we'd be able to move a lot of these those people from part-time jobs to full-time jobs with decent pay and benefits.
"We wanted to make Fountain House a showpiece," he continued, "and we became one. Nothing happens without persistence."
Schmidt had advice for those who are dismissive of people experiencing mental illnesses.
"Behaviors aren't the whole person, and not the same as the person. You have to look beyond the pathology. People with mental illnesses have a lot more capacity than we give them credit for. And give them credit. If people don't think you're on their side, they're not going to do very well.
"But you can't just get by on good feelings or just believing in the clubhouse model," he said. "It isn't a religion, for God's sake. The goal is to get people free of a system that disables them. The goal is to get people full-time employment with some kind of continuing education."
Schmidt became executive director of Fountain House after Beard's death in 1982 and served in that capacity until he retired in 1992. Schmidt continued to advise in behalf of vocational clubhouses internationally by visiting clubhouses in Pakistan, Egypt, Moscow, Finland and Sweden. Today, there are more than 325 such clubhouses worldwide, including the KBH affiliates in Waterville and Augusta, and the forthcoming unit in Lewiston.
Capitol Clubhouse Director Christine Berry remembered Schmidt as one who "saw success and potential in every person he met who was challenged by mental illness. Jim took the time to get to know clubhouse members and always wanted to hear their 'story.' He was enthusiastic, passionate and always motivated to talk about full-time employment and educational opportunities for clubhouse members."
For his work, Schmidt in 1997 received the Alice Fordyce Public Service Award at a United Nations Award celebration in New York City. He also was honored for guiding Fountain House programs through a worldwide expansion. Gov. John E. Baldacci's administration recognized Schmidt for his contributions to the field of mental health in 2010.
Lisa Soucie, Director of High Hopes Clubhouse in Waterville, said, "The world is a better place for having had Jim in it. He saved lives and he changed lives. He had a strong conviction and belief in people who have a mental illness to live their lives to their fullest capacity."
Schmidt received his bachelor's degree in Foreign Service from Georgetown University in 1949, and his graduate degree in social work from Columbia University in 1954. During World War II, he served as a Navy Seaman 1st Class.
He was very involved with the Waterville Rotary Club over the last 20 years, and was a member of Champions Fitness Club and the Waterville Country Club, where he enjoyed playing golf. In his 70s, Schmidt took up what would become his favorite hobby, flying his Cessna after earning his pilot's license and instrument rating.
He is survived by his wife of 51 years, Dr. Marian "Mollie" Schmidt, their four children Emilie van Eeghen of Canaan, Maine; Connie van Eeghen of Vermont; James Schmidt of New Jersey; and Clifford Schmidt of New York City; nine grandchildren and two great-grandchildren; and the children of his late sister, Constance Szuberla. Those nieces and nephew are Regina Colias, Christine Bremer, Teresa Amburn and Steve Szuberla, all of Illinois.
Donations in Jim's name may be made to the High Hopes Clubhouse Employment Program in care of Kennebec Behavioral Health, 67 Eustis Parkway, Waterville, ME 04901.
|
|
| KBH thanks board members for their service |
Kennebec Behavioral Health has announced the composition of its community-based Boards of Directors for fiscal year 2011-2012. They are as follows:
KMHA Board:
- William I. Branch of Vassalboro
- Ronald A. Ducharme of Winslow
- President/Secretary: Elaine E. Fuller of Manchester
- Vice President/Treasurer: Samuel N. Goddard of China Village
- Frederic J. Olsen of Albion
- Carol A. Welch of Waterville
- Rosalie Williams of Pittsfield
KMHA Foundation Board:
- Vice President/Treasurer: Leon A. Duff of Vassalboro
- Rev. Dr. Alice Anderman of Waterville
- President/Secretary: Sheryl A. Milliard of Sidney
- Lucille D. Zelenkewich of Winslow
KBH Programs and Services Board:
- Marilyn E. Canavan of Waterville
- Patsy Garside Crockett of Augusta
- Rep. Patrick S. A. Flood of Winthrop
- President/Secretary: Samuel N. Goddard of China Village
- Carol A. Norcross of Augusta
- Vice President/Treasurer: Terri T. Watson of Manchester
KMHA Real Estate Board:
- James E. Coffin of Farmingdale
- President/Secretary: Sally E. Dyer of Canaan
- Vice President/Treasurer: Clifford A. Manchester of Waterville
- Robert J. Ringer Jr. of Waterville
- Norman St. Hilaire of Farmingdale
Kennebec Behavioral Health is a mental health and substance-abuse agency with 330 employees and a $13 million payroll. KBH provides services and supports to more than 13,500 Mainers last year.
For details about all agency programs, go online to kbhmaine.org.
|
|
|
|
Press Room
Visit the Press Room for links to articles about KBH from the news media and our latest press releases.
|
|
