NAD President Lange Names Chair of Mental Health Committee

Andrew Lange, president of the National Association of the Deaf (NAD) selected Brad Trotter to serve as the chair of the NAD Mental Health Committee.

"The status of mental health services for deaf and hard of hearing people in the United States has been a priority of the NAD for a long time," stated NAD President Andrew J. Lange. "We are pleased that a person of Brad Trotter's caliber will chair the NAD Mental Health Committee to address concerns in this area."

Trotter is a Program Manager with the North Carolina Division of Mental Health, Developmental Disabilities and Substance Abuse Services. Since 1999, he has managed the development, expansion and operation of mental health and substance abuse services in North Carolina for the Deaf, Hard of Hearing and Deaf-Blind. The division includes 20 regional clinicians, an inpatient psychiatric unit at Dorothea Dix Hospital in Raleigh, and an inpatient substance abuse treatment program for Deaf adults at Walter B. Jones Alcohol and Drug Abuse Treatment Center in Greenville.

"I am honored to be selected by my peers to lead NAD efforts to expand mental health and substance abuse services for deaf, hard of hearing, and deaf-blind Americans," Trotter commented. "I would like to publicly thank Dr. Randy Myers and members of the NAD Mental Health Committee for their past work. We will build upon the Mental Health position statement they crafted last year.

"As I write, there are only a handful of States that provide culturally competent and language accessible mental health/substance abuse services even though civil rights legislation has been on the books for a long time. These circumstances are not acceptable and I am confident we can change things for the better. How? Through communicating with each other, educating one another about the needs of people who experience mental illness and/or substance abuse problems, and working together when service systems need to be challenged," he added.

A small steering committee has been selected to refocus the work of the NAD Mental Health Committee. In the next two years, this committee will work to develop comprehensive programs in three 'demonstration' states. These efforts will lead to a model that other states can utilize to develop their own local services. As the work of the steering committee expands, there will be a place at the table for everyone: consumers, family members, advocates, clinicians and other stakeholders.

Steering committee members are: Suzanne Dennis (KS); Steven Hamerdinger (AL); Brad Houck (OR); Morag McDonald (CT); Julia Peterson (WA); Linda Russell (WI), and Brad Trotter (NC).

If you would like to be involved, please email:
brad.trotter@gmail.com [2].

For information on the NAD Position Statement on Mental
Health, go to:
http://www.nad.org/site/pp.asp?c=foINKQMBF&b=99550 [3]