Sheriff says proposed mental health cuts would burden L.A. jails
May 25, 2010 | 2:08 pm
County Sheriff Lee Baca on Tuesday blasted cuts to mental health services in the Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's proposed budget, saying they would burden the county’s already overcrowded jails.
Baca estimated that the Sheriff's Department currently has about 2,500 inmates with mental health problems in its jails, many of them in the Twin Towers facility in downtown Los Angeles. Critics have asserted that the number of mentally ill inmates is much higher, with many landing in Men’s Central Jail, a facility less equipped for mental health care.
Cutting funding to community mental health services would push the mentally ill out of clinics, onto the streets and, for many, eventually into the jails, Baca said.
“Los Angeles County jails are already the largest mental health provider in the country,” Baca said. “The timing of these cuts could not come at a worse time.”
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Consider it a miracle that this record is even here. Roky Erickson is one of rock’s survivors a psychedelic pioneer who wrote the hit “You’re Gonna Miss Me’’ for his band the 13th Floor Elevators, but then fell into a fog from a reported 300 acid trips and finally into a prison for the criminally insane for a few years after being arrested for possessing a single joint in his native Texas. Erickson has surfaced periodically, but this is his first album in 15 years and it’s a beguiling, surprisingly clear-eyed gem. It contains many songs he wrote in prison some are the original recordings with a tinny, primitive acoustic guitar lent by prison staff; others are newly sung and backed by Austin disciples Okkervil River. Okkervil’s Will Sheff overdoes a few arrangements but mostly keeps with Erickson’s haunting, to-hell-and-back vocals typified by “Please, Judge’’ (about begging for his freedom), the devotional “Forever’’ (one of several tracks espousing God), and the Dylanesque title track. This album isn’t for everyone, but it’s as open-hearted and grittily triumphant as any you’ll hear this year. Think of Wilco meeting Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois at times. And think of what we missed by not having Roky around in his prime. Eccentric and fascinating, this almost feels like Erickson’s “Pet Sounds.’’