Every year, Chuck commits to traveling to all62 counties in New York to meet with constituents.
Standing at Helio Health’s Child and Adolescent Center on March 25,2019, U.S. Senator Charles E. Schumer launched a major push to pass the recently-introduced Excellence in Mental Health and Addiction Treatment Expansion Act. This bipartisan legislation, introduced in the Senate by Senators Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) and Roy Blunt (R-MO) and cosponsored by Senator Schumer, would extend funding for the Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinics (CCBHCs) pilot program, which authorizes the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) to provide enhanced payments through Medicaid to hospitals and health care providers in 8 states, including New York, to offer comprehensive opioid addiction and mental health care services to thousands of adults and children per year. Schumer explained that Helio is home to one of these CCBHC’s, and that the pilot program has allowed the agency to put a real dent in the shortage of opioid addiction and mental health services in Central New York by hiring additional staff, reducing treatment wait times, increasing medically assisted treatment and adding new services like its children and adolescent outpatient clinic and 24/7 walk in assessments. Schumer said that with Central New York still suffering from the scourge of the opioid crisis and lack of mental health services, and with funding for New York State’s CCBHC’s set to expire this June, Congress must pass the Excellence in Mental Health and Addiction Treatment Expansion Act as soon as possible, to ensure that the residents of Central New York and Syracuse have access to the addiction and mental health care services and treatment options that they need and deserve.