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Center honored for aid to people with problems
By JON WILSON © St. Petersburg Times, published January 31, 2001 ST. PETERSBURG -- When a 48-year-old woman finished a stay at an emergency mental health care facility, she had no home. Boley Centers placed her in an efficiency apartment, and she has been there nearly a year. A 49-year-old man diagnosed with clinical depression needed housing and a job. Boley helped him get both. They are just two examples. Every year, Boley helps hundreds of people with emotional, psychiatric or behavioral problems towards self-sufficiency. For its efforts in providing housing and employment, the St. Petersburg-based center recently earned state and national recognition. The President's Committee on Employment of People with Disabilities named Boley as one of 24 programs nationwide -- and Florida's only one -- as a "best practices" employment program for people with psychiatric disabilities. And the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, a Florida advocacy organization, cited Boley for finding innovative housing solutions. The alliance also cited another Pinellas County agency, Gulf Coast Jewish Family Services, for its work with mentally ill senior citizens. Boley, founded in 1970, is considered the largest residential program for people with psychiatric disabilities in the southeastern United States. It operates 26 housing and service centers in Pinellas and owns or manages 479 housing units. It includes various levels of transitional housing, including group homes for people coming out of state hospitals or jails, for example. There is also supervised housing and permanent, unsupervised housing available. "A lot of it is transitional. They stay there until they get better and then move to another level of care," said Paula Hays, Boley Centers president. "As they get better, they're moving toward having a situation that is very good," Hays said. Robert Jassmann, the 49-year-old man, moved two weeks ago into a Pinellas Park condominium. He had previously lived in Boley housing and took budgeting and mortgage classes through the center. Said Hays: "This is very rare throughout the country. The thinking has been that people with severe mental illness can't own homes. There haven't been any foreclosures in the four years (it has operated here)." The home ownership program has allowed 20 people to buy homes, said Boley executive vice president Gary MacMath. Another innovative housing program benefits people who are both homeless and mentally disabled. That program began in 1988 with 20 units and has grown to 58, MacMath said. Jassmann also worked with a Boley job coach before going to work two years ago at a Taco Bell, where he works three days a week. He pays for his condo apartment through Social Security payments and the wages he earns. It is important for people with mental health issues not to feel pushed, say professionals who work with them. Boley typically allows its clients to progress at their own pace. "There is no pressuring. When I went to Taco Bell, I was ready for Taco Bell," Jassmann said. Boley helped find 315 jobs for mentally disabled people from July 1999 through June 2000; since then, it has placed another 150 people.
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From the Times South Pinellas desks |
