House panel defers privatization bill

• By SARAH CHACKO
• Advocate Capitol News Bureau
• Published: May 23, 2008 - Page: 5A - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

• Print
• Email
• Save
• Reprints
• Twitter
• Share

• Del.icio.us
• Digg
• Facebook
• Reddit
• 

Legislation that would have allowed the state to privatize a facility for certain mental health patients failed to get approval from a House committee Thursday.

House Bill 737, as amended in the committee, would have allowed the state Department of Health and Hospitals to contract with private companies to build a 160-bed facility and provide services for people in prison who are found mentally incompetent to stand trial.

State Rep. Kay Katz, R-Monroe and sponsor of the bill, said it was never her intent to take away hospital beds or cost a single person a job.

“There is a critical shortage of forensic psychiatric beds in Louisiana,” Katz said. “This is an opportunity to go out and look for some private companies.”

Jennifer Kopke, assistant secretary of DHH’s Office of Mental Health, later said there are 315 beds available in the state for forensic psychiatric services.

Kopke said about 170 people are waiting in jail for an available bed.

Kopke said the department is seeking funding in the state budget for additional facilities.

“Maybe you can pull $40 million out of a hat,” Katz said when a member of the House Committee on Health and Welfare asked her about seeking state funding for more facilities.

About 30 people filed cards in opposition of the bill but only one person spoke to the committee.

Louisiana AFL-CIO President Louis Reine said he believed Katz had good intentions with the measure but it was “the camel’s nose under the tent of privatization.”

“Unfortunately I think it’s more a discussion now about money than it is about people,” Reine said.

State Rep. Robert Johnson, D-Marksville, said it seems like the state wants to privatize these areas to get rid of the charity hospital system that is costing the state money.

“The state’s not in this to make profits and private industry is and that’s where it concerns me,” Johnson said.