By Hank Russell
Two Long Island health service centers were each given $450,000 in one-time start-up funding from the state’s Office of Mental Health to establish Youth Assertive Community Treatment (Youth ACT) teams, with each facility serving up to 36 children between the ages of 10 and 21 with emotional and mental health issues.
CEC Health Care — formerly known as Charles Evans Center — provides medically underserved individuals access to high-quality comprehensive medical, dental and behavioral health care to improve their well-being and quality of life. The center has locations in Hauppauge, Bethpage, Seaford and Glen Cove.
Central Nassau Guidance & Counseling Services in Hicksville treats children, adolescents, and families who have experienced traumatic events will its NCTSI program’s numerous evidence-based practices. These practices address complex trauma, including adverse childhood experiences, grief, disaster (e.g., COVID-19), race-based and hate-based trauma, historical trauma, and complex physical and emotional trauma.
Youth ACT teams include mental health clinicians and psychiatric prescribers, peer advocates, and clinical support staff, offering 24-hour support, seven days per week. These teams are focused on improving or ameliorating the significant functional impairments and severe symptomatology experienced by the youth due to mental illness or serious emotional disturbance.
In addition to announcing the awards, Governor Kathy Hochul also issued a proclamation designating Children’s Mental Health Awareness Week in New York State. The proclamation was presented this week during the annual ‘What’s Great in Our State’ Celebration of Children’s Mental Health event in Albany, which recognizes individuals and programs successfully advancing the cause of children’s mental health.
“Children and youth living with mental illness sometimes require additional care to remain at home or return back into the community,” Hochul said. “This expansion of our Youth ACT program will help provide more families with this critical support and the services they can rely on to bring their child home after inpatient care or from a residential facility.”
Dr. Ann Sullivan, the state’s Mental Health Commissioner, said, “New York’s Youth ACT program is a fantastic first-in-the-nation adaptation to a model that has proven extremely successful with adults living with mental illness. By adding teams statewide, we can help more young people and their families to access the care and support they can use to live and thrive within their community. The expansion of this successful program demonstrates Governor Hochul’s ongoing commitment to expand access to mental healthcare throughout our state.”