Pavliga Announces Funding for NEOMED, Millions for Mental Health

State Rep. Gail Pavliga (R-Portage County) announces funding coming to Portage County for Northeast Ohio Medical University (NEOMED) and millions more for the Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services to help families and children throughout the state. The funding was approved during Monday’s State Controlling Board meeting.

“At the Statehouse, myself and many of my colleagues have continued to support bills that are providing substantial funding for our higher education institutions and others focused on addressing mental health issues across Portage County and our state,” Pavliga said.

NEOMED’s President John Langell also touted the funding coming to the institution.

“The safety of our students, employees and other members of the NEOMED community including visitors to our campus is always a primary concern,” said NEOMED President John Langell, M.D., Ph.D., M.P.H., M.B.A. “So, we appreciate Rep. Pavliga’s support and the state funding of $483,000 to ensure we maintain a state-of the-art surveillance system.”

The following measures were approved during the meeting:

• $483,000 – Northeast Ohio Medical University for upgraded and enhanced Distributed Antenna System (DAS) and video security surveillance system.
• $4.55 million – Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services to support a cross-system Child and Adolescent Behavioral Health Center of Excellence. This initiative will be building and sustaining a standardized assessment process, evaluating the effectiveness of services and expanding service and care coordination capacity for children with complex behavioral health needs and their families. Additionally, it will be used to prepare the workforce for its implementation to enroll the thousands of children admitted into the program.
• $2 million – Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services for statewide treatment and prevention through Multisystemic Therapy (MST) and Functional Family Therapy to serve youth in their homes and communities.
• $40,000 – Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services to provide training to assist existing staff improve their knowledge and skills with assessing forensic patients and providing direct examination and court reports as needed.
• $1.1 million – Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services for continued use of the automated medication dispensing system to help clinicians dispense medications at all psychiatric hospitals.

Pavliga supported both House Bill 110, the state budget, and House Bill 597, which provided the funding for these various initiatives.

The next State Controlling Board meeting is scheduled for Aug. 1.