Mayor Tells NYPD, FDNY To Involuntarily Commit More Mentally Ill NYers

NEW YORK CITY — More New Yorkers who appear severely mentally ill will be involuntarily taken off the street faster and committed for their own good, Mayor Eric Adams said.

A new directive to NYPD, FDNY and other first responders will set up an expanded and expedited process for involuntarily transporting people experiencing a mental health crisis to a hospital, Adams said.

The directive clarifies that not just people who are violent, suicidal or dangerous can be sent to the hospital against their will, but also those whose mental illness creates an "inability to meet" their own basic needs, Adams said.

"It is not acceptable for us to see someone who clearly needs help and walk past," he said.

Adams' announcement came during an address Tuesday on what he called a city crisis: people with untreated severe mental illness who live out in the open, on streets and in subways.

But the plan to involuntarily send such people to the hospital if they appear to be having mental health problems drew sharp criticism from advocates, who argued it would violate the rights of New Yorkers who pose no imminent harm.

"The decades-old practice of sweeping deep-seated problems out of public view may play well for the politicians, but the problems will persist – for vulnerable people in desperate need of government services and for New Yorkers," said Donna Lieberman, executive director for the New York Civil Liberties Union, in a statement.

“The Mayor’s attempt to police away homelessness and sweep individuals out of sight is a page from the failed Giuliani playbook. With no real plan for housing, services, or supports, the administration is choosing handcuffs and coercion.”

Involuntary commitments won't help mentally ill New Yorkers, especially if they're started by cops, said Jawanza Williams, director of organizing for VOCAL-NY.

“New Yorkers will see this plan for what it is: a draconian attempt to say the Adams’ administration is tackling a problem, while only making it worse," Williams said in a statement.

"The lives of people dealing with mental health crises won’t be improved by forcing them into treatment, especially if it’s coming from law enforcement. All this directive will do is disappear them."

Adams argued that hundreds of New Yorkers need intervention that sends them to the hospital against their will for necessary mental health treatment, he said.

But he said responders are often under the misunderstanding that they can only intervene if someone is violent, suicidal or present a risk of imminent harm, which he claimed is "myth."

State health laws give the city sweeping authority to do involuntarily take people to the hospital, Adams said. He recounted recently seeing police officers in subway stations who effectively ignored people in clear need of mental health help.

"In short, we are confirming that a person’s 'inability to meet basic needs,' to the extent that it poses a risk of harm, is part of the standard for mental health interventions," he said.

Lieberman said Adams' plan plays "fast and loose" with legal rights.

"The federal and state constitutions impose strict limits on the government’s ability to detain people experiencing mental illness – limits that the Mayor’s proposed expansion is likely to violate," she said.

Adams also pushed for an 11-point legislative agenda he'll push Gov. Kathy Hochul to support. The agenda argues state laws should be more clear about when involuntary hospital admissions can be made, as well as stricter discharge procedures.

Advocates with The Legal Aid Society and public defender groups notably withheld any specific support for Adams' plan. In a joint statement, they argued that upcoming state legislation could present a different solution.

“Pending legislation in Albany, the Treatment Not Jail Act, offers a voluntary, court-based, structured, and proven-effective method of connecting those in the criminal legal system with underlying mental health issues with the treatment and services they need," they said.

“Rather than jailing people with underlying mental illnesses and similar disorders, and then abandoning them to a chaotic and unsupported transition process when they are released into the community, mental health and drug treatment courts along with the accompanying robust community services they provide, lead to greater public health and public safety."