Two months after Mayor Eric Adams announced a new policy expanding involuntary hospitalizations of homeless and mentally ill New Yorkers, Brooklyn-based mental health advocates are hoping more comprehensive and compassionate approach is possible.
In late November, Adams announced that first responders and members of the city’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene would have the authority to commit someone who “appears to be mentally ill and displays an inability to meet basic living needs, even when no recent dangerous act has been observed” to the hospital. Previous policies authorized police or licensed medical professionals to involuntarily hospitalize someone only if they were acting in a way that presented a threat to themselves or others.
