3.18.10
RALEIGH – Outside a renovated red brick schoolhouse in one of Raleigh’s toughest neighborhoods, patients with severe and persistent mental illness quietly come and go.
For more than two decades, the unassuming Inner-City Mental Health clinic has doggedly served about 150 people, most of whom live in the surrounding area.
It is, by every measure, a successful and well-run clinic. Yet the county’s proposed budget for next year would shutter it for good.
The county is trying to patch a $12 million to $18 million spending gap. County Manager David Cooke has asked every department to identify 7 percent in savings. That’s all fine and good.
But would closing the Inner City clinic save money in the end?
Just the opposite.
For the people who rely on the clinic week in, week out, month in, month out, this would be like setting fire to a safety net.
