Opinion | Alvin Bragg: We Must Address New York City’s Mental Health Crisis

In September 1958, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was stabbed with a seven-inch steel letter opener. He had been autographing copies of his first book in Blumstein’s department store in Harlem. The woman who stabbed him was named Izola Ware Curry.

When Dr. King found out she was schizophrenic, he harbored no ill will toward her, saying instead, “I know that we want her to receive the necessary treatment so that she may become a constructive citizen in an integrated society where a disorganized personality need not become a menace to any man.”

Dated description aside, King recognized that people in crisis need mental health care to be healthy and safe. The many Izola Ware Currys in New York today are far more likely to find themselves in jail, or relegated to street corners and subway stations, than they are to receive comprehensive treatment. This disconnect can set the stage for people with mental illness to be both victims and perpetrators of real violence.

Mental illness isn’t a crime, and jail isn’t the answer for those experiencing it. We must meet the needs of people in crisis with treatment and support. In order to do so, we need more funding.

Lawmakers in Albany right now are in the final stages of negotiating our state budget. Gov. Kathy Hochul and the leaders of the Senate and Assembly must make good on their earlier support for significant investments in mental health care — especially for New Yorkers who have been struggling, posing potential dangers to themselves and others. Doing so now can reduce assaults in our city by people experiencing mental health crises. They can also ensure that when those people do commit crimes, they are held accountable in a manner that reduces recidivism.

Around half of people in New York City jails — some 3,000 men and women — have been diagnosed with some degree of mental illness. On any given day, hundreds await evaluations or beds at dwindling and overwhelmed state psychiatric hospitals. On a typical day at Manhattan Criminal Court, you’ll witness the churn of people struggling with mental illness, caught up in a cycle of recidivism and incarceration instead of receiving the therapy, medication and other services that would help them lead healthy, productive lives.

And it’s not only New York. According to the Vera Institute of Justice, in the United States, people with serious mental illness are more likely to encounter law enforcement than they are to receive treatment. Since the 1950s, around the time King barely dodged death, the number of state hospital psychiatric beds has decreased by around 94 percent. In many cases, jails and prisons filled the void. While large-scale psychiatric institutionalization was far from perfect — to say the very least — meaningful community-based alternatives never materialized.

Today, corrections facilities double as de facto mental health hospitals across the nation — and about 63 percent of those with a history of mental illness do not receive treatment while incarcerated in state and federal prison.

But it is in New York City where the failed mental health system seems to be on starkest display.

Desperate scenes of people in clear distress on subway platforms, in city parks and on bustling street corners, are commonplace. And although overall crime is down, the city has witnessed terrifying acts of violence and alarming incidents of disorder. Innocent people shoved in front of oncoming trains is a citywide nightmare. Women fear being randomly punched while walking down the street. This is a humanitarian disaster, and a public health and safety crisis.

We must do better — for those with real and complex mental health needs, and for all New Yorkers who currently fear for their safety. But attaining a comprehensive mental health system won’t happen overnight.

In the past few years, I’ve committed $9 million to two programs, Neighborhood Navigators and Court Navigators. In both programs, individuals with lived experience — designated “navigators”— help guide our struggling neighbors through the complex landscape of social services. It’s a start, but so much more is needed.

This year’s state budget is another opportunity to continue to build New York’s mental health infrastructure. My office submitted a detailed proposal to Albany leaders outlining mental health investments that are urgently needed this year. If we fail to take systemic action, New Yorkers will continue to confront daily scenes of desperation, and risk falling victim to shocking — but not surprising — acts of arbitrary violence.

Most directly related to the work of the Manhattan district attorney’s office, I’ve asked Albany to invest at least $25 million to expand and strengthen New York’s problem-solving courts. Such courts provide precisely the kind of treatment options that King may have wanted for his attacker, but that did not exist then. In exchange for pleading guilty, participants are offered court-supervised treatment instead of incarceration.

If they comply with their treatment plan and avoid rearrest (typically for 18 to 24 months), their felony plea can be reduced to a misdemeanor or dismissed. One mental health court found that it reduced the likelihood of rearrest by 46 percent.

I also urged Albany leaders to fund community-based mental health treatment, investing $16.3 million to fund 20 new teams to provide support to justice-involved individuals with serious mental illness. Similar initiatives have been shown to reduce overall recidivism.

For those who cannot be safely diverted from incarceration to treatment in the community, Hope House, which recently broke ground in the Bronx, will soon offer a safe and humane alternative to the Rikers Island jail complex, with 24-hour security and therapeutic treatment. The state should commit $30 million in capital funding to scale up the Hope House model.

Supportive housing provides essential stability to those with mental illness who have been justice-involved. Thousands of individuals returning to New York City from state prison go straight to shelters. Homelessness increases the risk of incarceration, which in turn increases the risk of homelessness. To break this vicious cycle, Albany should invest in building 500 new re-entry apartments over the next three years, and should expand an existing housing program for people leaving city jails.

Since I took office, we have made substantial progress in driving down murders and shootings in Manhattan, but the rise in felony assaults remains a persistent challenge. To reverse the post-Covid rise in random assaults of and by people with untreated mental illness, prevention-oriented investments are critical; enforcement has little deterrence value for crimes committed by those experiencing a mental health crisis.

Following his brush with death at the hands of Izola Ware Curry, King recognized treatment as the best path to keep those with mental illness, and those around them, safe. With assaults like the one King suffered becoming more common, our leaders in Albany must heed his call today and invest in a comprehensive mental health network.

Now is the time for action to address our mental health emergency.