Supporting Community Members Since 1947
Partner for Mental Health has served the greater Charlottesville community as an affiliate of Mental Health America since 1947. As community needs have changed over time, our efforts have changed, though our goal has always been to help build a community best able to support its members living with mental illness.
Meet our 2024 Team:
Kate Acuff, JD, PhD – Executive Director
Sue Hess, MSN RN – Navigator Supervisor/HART Community Navigator
Virginia Leavell – Justice Systems/HART/CARS Community Navigator
Veronica Espinosa, HCW, PRS – Therapeutic Docket Community Navigator
Kay Robertson, CPRS-T, RPRS, iFPRS-T- Therapeutic Docket Community Navigator and PMH Administrator
Norman Dorise, (pending) QMHP – ANCHOR Community Navigator
Pamela Coburn, CPRS – ANCHOR Community Navigator
Board of Directors:
Shaune McKinnon, DNP, MSN, APRN, PMHNP-BC – President
Wes Campbell, PhD, MHA, FACHE
Monte Glanzer, CPA
Helen Dunn, PhD
Julie Roebuck, DNP, PMHNP
Megan Martin, MPH
Randall Boyts
Contributions through the decades…
1950s
Lacking a public mental health system, we coordinated the provision of low-cost and pro-bono delivery of care by private providers to community members who otherwise lacked access to services.
1960s
We advocated for the creation of and helped establish the local public mental health agency, Region Ten Community Services Board, to increase access to community-based care.
1970s & 1980s
With a focus on exposing and improving conditions within state-run psychiatric hospitals, our efforts culminated in a report on conditions within Western State Hospital—the state hospital serving Charlottesville area residents—that was credited with catalyzing the modernization of Virginia’s inpatient treatment system.
2000s
As an incubator of solutions to identify gaps in the community’s mental health service system, we helped launch initiatives serving the local Charlottesville community, including:
• Crisis Intervention Training for local law enforcement officers and other first responders
• The Community Mental Health and Wellness Coalition
• Georgia’s Healing House
Navigation services began with PMH staff positioned at Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail, UVA Hospital, and the Albemarle Charlottesville Therapeutic Docket.
Currently…
In the last decade, Partner for Mental Health was mainly focused in advocacy for legislative and system changes and contributed to the Virginia Behavioral Health Service System Redesign Project, the impetus for the redesign Virginia’s publicly funded mental health service system into a seamless continuum of evidence-based care.
We consulted on the development of the Alternative Transportation for Temporary Detaining Order (TDO) policy and procedures, which prevents people in mental health crisis from the traumatizing experience being transported in a police car.
We served as an advisor to the Commonwealth’s Commission on Mental Health Law Reform, including revising the ECO/TDO statute after the mass shooting at Virginia Tech.
We are worked with Delegate Hope and the Deeds Commission to draft improvements to Virginia’s Mandatory Outpatient Treatment statute for consideration in the 2021 General Assembly Session.
In partnership with the Institute of Law, Psychiatry and Public Policy at the University of Virginia, Virginia’s Medicaid Office, and the Department of Behavioral Health Services, we lead a project to propose policy and practice changes designed to facilitate more rapid entry into Medicaid funded residential substance abuse treatment services.
Partner for Mental Health’s Navigators have been assisting individuals in accessing and navigating the complex array of mental health services and resources available to them. Our Navigators provide critical and timely assistance in crisis management by educating those we reach about prevention, advocating for their individual rights and their access to healthcare, and connecting them to resources to help with their goals. Our staff in 2018 started working with the Albemarle Charlottesville Therapeutic Docket to provide navigation services within the program. Our two navigators, Raven Brooks and Veronica Espinoza, have successfully helped several individuals graduate from the program over the past five years. Community navigator and certified peer support specialist and trainer, Kay Robertson stepped into Raven’s role in November of 2023.
In recent years, the traditional approaches to emergency response have been evolving to meet the complex needs of modern societies. One significant development in this evolution is the emergence of Alternative Response Teams (ARTs). These teams represent a paradigm shift in crisis intervention and community work, aiming to provide more nuanced and effective support in situations that do not strictly require justice systems or medical intervention. ARTs are composed of professionals trained in various disciplines such as Navigators, social work, mental health counseling, crisis intervention, and community outreach. One of the key motivations behind the creation of ARTs is the recognition that many emergency situations are rooted in underlying social or mental health issues rather than criminal behavior.
Marcus Alert, sometimes called the Marcus David-Peters Act, is a law passed by the Virginia General Assembly in 2020 that directs localities throughout theCommonweath to “develop and establish a mental health awareness response and
community understanding services (Marcus)
alert system.” The law is named in honor of Marcus David-
Peters, a high school biology teacher who was killed by a police officer in Richmond while experiencing a behavioral health crisis in 2018.
We have partnered with the Albemarle Rescue Squad to form HART: Human Services Alternative Response Team: as an alternative to police being the first response to behavioral health and substance use emergencies. HART partners with navigators to provide follow-up services to address referrals for treatment, continued home care, harm reduction supplies, and much more. Sue Hess, our lead navigator, has taken point on this project in collaboration with part-time assistance from community navigator and Charlottesville Rescue Squad cheif, our newest hire, Virginia Leavell.
In November of 2023, we were approved by Col. Martin Kumer to offer community re-entry navigation at the Albemarle Charlottesville Regional Jail and began services in December. Virginia has also taken point to offer her expertise as our Justice Systems Community Navigator.
With the successes of our navigation programs, the City of Charlottesville took notice and a partnership was formed with PMH, Charlottesville Police Department an theCharlottesville Fire Department to form the ANCHOR Team to provide support in June of 2024. ANCHOR stands for Assisting Navigation, Crisis Help, and Outreach Resource. ACHOR is like HART which is also an alternative response team. CPD and/or CFD will contact ANCHOR to respond to a community member having any mental health crisis once the situation is assessed for safety and other concerns.
Pamela Coburn, one of the state of Virginia’s first certified peer support specialists, and Norman Dorise, successful community health/prevention specialist and pending QMHP (quality mental health professional) were hired specifically for Partner for Mental Health’s roles on the team in July of 2024. In their first few weeks, they have both made a critical impact.
Increasing Access to Justice for People with Mental Illness
During the 2021 Virginia legislative session, Partner for Mental Health was a key advocate in ensuring the final passage of one of the state’s most significant criminal procedure reforms in decades. The new legislation (HB2047 and SB1315) increases justice for those with a mental health, developmental, or intellectual disability by:
- Allowing defendants with mental illness (as well as intellectual or developmental disabilities) to introduce evidence in court pertaining to their diagnosis and how it may have impacted their mental state at the time of the alleged offense.
- Nullifying a Virginia Supreme Court ruling from 1985 that banned the introduction of such evidence during a trial.
- Requiring judges to consider mental illness, intellectual disability, and developmental disability during the bail and trial process.
- Requiring training for court-appointed lawyers to help them understand the unique responsibility of representing defendants with such conditions.
- Requiring the defense to provide notice to the prosecution of their plans to introduce this evidence.
- Allowing someone found not guilty under this provision to be civilly committed under a Temporary Detention Order if they meet commitment criteria.
“This bill allows a person’s whole story to be told in the guilt phase of a trial. Its passage is one of the more remarkable changes we’ve made to criminal justice. If we are serious when we decry treating those who suffer with a mental illness as criminals, this bill is necessary and logical, and will help us build a more just society.”
–Senator Creigh Deeds (D-Bath)