LOUISIANA Community Mental Health Services Block Grant ...

Public Health, the Office for Citizens with Developmental Disabilities, the Office of Management
and Finance (including the State Medicaid agency), and the Office of Aging and Adult Services.
The 2009 Regular Session of the Louisiana legislature, passed into law ACT No. 384 creating the
Office of Behavioral Health. ACT 384 dissolved the Office of Mental Health and the Office for
Addictive Disorders, and merged the administration and planning functions of each office into one.
This move was made in order to allow for best practices in the treatment of individuals with mental
illness, addictive disorders, and co-occurring disorders, while maximizing available funding. With
time, the consolidation of the administration of the offices of mental illness and addictive disorders
into the Office of Behavioral Health will offer less redundancy and greater benefits to Louisiana
citizens in need of these services. It is also anticipated that in the future, the merger will lead to a
strengthening of the link to primary care.
In order to assist the reader in understanding the State mental health care system, a map of
Louisiana that illustrates the geographic Regions or Local Governing Entities (LGEs), and the
organizational chart of DHH are included in this section. At the time of this writing, the
organizational chart for the new OBH had not been finalized. It should be noted that the Mental
Health Planning Council will occupy a prominent place in the formal OBH organizational chart.
Since 2004 the Planning Council Liaison has acted as an important and effective link between the
Planning Council and OMH and will continue to fulfill this role with OBH.
State Agency Leadership & Description of Regional Resources
The Office of Behavioral Health (OBH) is the state agency currently responsible for planning,
developing, operating, and evaluating public mental health services and addictive disorder services
for the citizens of the State. Mental health services are targeted to adults with a severe mental
illness, children and adolescents with a serious emotional/behavioral disorder, and all people
experiencing an acute mental illness. While there is no separate state-wide division for children‟s
services, the provision of Child / Youth Best Practices has recently occupied a prominent position in
the functioning of the agency. Regions and LGEs must maintain Regional Advisory Councils
officially linked to the State Mental Health Planning Council in order to qualify to receive Block
Grant funding.
Legislation has mandated that the administration of the Louisiana mental health care system change
from interrelated geographic Regions to a system of independent health care Districts or Authorities
(also referred to as Local Governing Entities or LGEs) under the general administration of OBH.
As of July, 2010, there are five LGEs in operation and five that are in various stages of the
transition to becoming LGEs. With the movement towards more LGEs comes the importance of
developing mechanisms to assure continuity of care and consistency of statewide standards of care
that are responsive to needs of consumers.
In the past, the Community Mental Health Clinic (CMHC) and State Hospital programs were all
directly operated by state civil servants with direct line of authority from the administrative central
office. The LGEs are (and will be) legislatively mandated as the local umbrella agencies that
administer the state-funded mental health, addictive disorder and developmental disability services
in an integrated system within their localities. The LGE model affords opportunity for greater
accountability and responsiveness to local communities since it is based on local control and local
authority. Each LGE is administered by an Executive Director who reports to a local governing
board of directors of community and consumer volunteers. All local governing entities remain part
PART C LOUISIANA FY 2011 PAGE 47
SECTION I: ADULT & CHILD/ YOUTH –DESCRIPTION OF STATE SERVICE SYSTEM
OVERVIEW, REGIONAL RESOURCES, LEADERSHIP