May 6, 2008
MHAC CENTENNIAL DINNER A SMASH
HIT
--250 Attendees Hear Attorney General and State
Comptroller
--100 Year Old Association Congratulated--
--President Beverly Walton Lauded--
by Richard B. Schreiber,
Chair of the Centennial Committee,
“After more than thirty years
at the helm of the Mental Health Association of
Connecticut, President and Chief Executive
Officer Beverly A. Walton intends to disembark
the ship.
A red-hot question often
asked is: how did it happen, 35 years ago, that
this alumna of Mount Holyoke College, an
economics major, no less, got involved in mental
health advocacy. No good clue can be found in
her college participation in the Fellowship of
Faiths, or the Glee Club, or staffing the Mount
Holyoke (campus) News.
Actually, Bev’s early
after-college work seemed very much in line with
her economics education and approach, including
her keen analytical skills and her ability to
interpret data and statistics. Each of those
strengths was surely of use at the Travelers
Insurance Company where Bev worked through the
1950s.
By the 1960s, Bev had become
very active with the League of Women voters,
authoring a regular feature, the “Capitol
Report” appearing in the League’s newsletter,
and speaking at sundry meetings as the League’s
Chairperson of the Committee on Connecticut
Finances. These roles too, are impressive. But
how did they move Bev into the arena of mental
health services and advocacy?
Here's some background:
Beginning in the 1950s, change was in the air.
There were faint but perceptible gestures that
Connecticut aimed to strengthen community-based
mental health services, moving from a system of
care for mental illness which poured the main
investment of public resources into three state
hospitals, one of which was an institution
Clifford Beers writes about in "A Mind That
Found Itself," the book you all now have.
Also in that same decade,
improvements in use of medications for severe
and chronic mental illness were being
recognized. And the demand for patients'
fundamental rights to treatment, not just
storage (consult your Beers book), was becoming
more insistent and more public. Change was
further invited as newspaper exposes of patient
mistreatment and exploitation were widely read.
Much of the needed change would come from
strengthening state and federal laws.
By the early 1970s, the
Mental Health Association was desperately in
need of someone who knew Connecticut’s
legislative scene, someone who knew how a bill
became law in this state, a person who was at
ease speaking at public hearings and generally
quite comfortable raising Hell in order to
garner support for the association’s legislative
agenda. Beverly, the smart, witty, sassy veteran
of League of Women Voters programs seemed just
right, and that was her 1973 entry
through the portal to mental health programs.
I was a member of the MHAC
search committee which interviewed Beverly 35
years ago for the position of legislative
liaison, or whatever the position was called in
those days—perhaps director of legislative
activities? or principal lobbyist for the
association? Something like that. I suppose my
experience in that interview, dazzled as I was
by Bev’s presentation and by her self-confidence
is what makes me, among current MHAC board
members, a suitable person to be reflecting on
the MHAC course steered by Bev these several
decades.
Since Bev's early MHAC days the years have
brought some caution to a private non-profit
agency's efforts to affect legislation. Any reference to
lobbying activities by the agency must be
watered down. It’s all tied up with the
organization’s non-profit status. If too much
lobbying is done then the agency will be
shadowed by the Internal Revenue Service. But,
thanks to Bev's resourcefulness, we still play
an active role, although never, never do we call
it “lobbying,” it’s “public affairs” or “public
policy” work now.
In 1978, five years after she
was hired to shoulder legislative
responsibilities for our agency, Bev became the
President of the association. She brought
substantial change to an organization which had
been somewhat interior-focused, spending much
time, and other resources, maintaining 5
sub-offices and 5 boards throughout the state.
That elaborate structure may have resulted from
the Clifford Beers' 1908 model of organizing the
Connecticut Society for Mental Hygiene. The
Beers' model was built on the premise that
needed changes in mental health care would come
from collegial influences by so-called
"important" establishment-connected people in
the community. It was a workable premise for the
turn of the century, but required serious
rethinking by mid-century.
Bev saw clearly that any
substantial change in business-as-usual in
mental health services would require some
confrontation with the establishment (“…first,
you have to get their attention, then we can
talk…”), and that the voices of consumers of
services would be most compelling. Bev cut 5
sub-offices of the association throughout the
state, and their boards.
Bev went on to lead the
agency to provide direct services to clients,
establishing programs in 8 locations throughout
the state, including Connecticut's first
rehabilitation program for deaf and hearing
impaired clients. When Bev became President the
organization served no clients directly, today
we serve more than 700 persons each year.
When Bev arrived, MHAC had an
annual budget of less than $150,000.00. These
days, we operate with an annual budget of more
than $9 million and we have substantial assets
in real estate and in an investment portfolio.
Other selected achievements of the association
during Beverly's years are mentioned in the
center spread in this evening's program book.
Read and be delighted!
But well beyond the dollar
value, and the extensive program activity built
by Bev, our out-going president's most widely
acknowledged achievement, remarkable both within
and outside of the agency, has been her superb
skill in selection of talented, knowledgeable,
resourceful and dedicated staff for the agency.
These women and men are an asset, brought
together by Beverly, that would be impossible to
duplicate.
Now, I turn to the architect
herself, the woman who has created so much for
our organization, Bev, get ready to receive a
gift which comes from a grateful Mental Health
Association of Connecticut. It boldly declares
that your leadership years show everywhere the
association thrives and grows.
I call on Joe Brislin to make the
presentation. Joe has been a member of MHAC's
governing body for many years, and is the
board's nominated chairperson for the term
beginning this June. Joe, please come forward.