The 15 community mental health centers provide a variety of services throughout the state, including "mental health services, as well as substance abuse and intellectual/developmental disabilities services."

The centers and the counties they serve in Northeast Mississippi are:

* Region II based in Oxford, serving Calhoun, DeSoto, Lafayette, Marshall, Panola, Tate and Yalobusha.

* Region III based in Tupelo, serving Benton, Chickasaw, Itawamba, Lee, Monroe, Pontotoc and Union.

* Region IV based in Corinth, serving Alcorn, Prentiss, Tippah and Tishomingo.

* Region VII based in Starkville serving Choctaw, Clay, Lowndes, Noxubee, Oktibbeha, Webster and Winston.

By Bobby Harrison

Daily Journal Jackson Bureau

JACKSON - Despite Gov. Haley Barbour's two vetoes of funding for the state's 15 community mental health centers, they apparently will remain open and provide the same services as before.

"We're right back with no changes," said Robert Smith, executive director of the Region III Center, which is based in Tupelo and serves seven Northeast Mississippi counties.

With the funding denied and the Legislature not allowed to take up the veto until January 2010, some have worried that the centers might have to cut services or, in some cases, close.

But apparently the state Department of Mental Health will provide the $10 million in funding needed for the community centers with the hope that the Legislature will provide a deficit appropriation to the department during the 2010 session.

Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Alan Nunnelee, R-Tupelo, said "it is not unusual" for the Legislature to make deficit appropriations for agencies when the previous session does not provide adequate funding.

In this case, though, the Legislature provided the funding, but Barbour vetoed it. The second veto was a partial veto of the Department of Mental Health budget that had about $8 million set aside for the centers.

The money would have been used to provide the match to draw down federal Medicaid dollars.

Barbour said he vetoed the second appropriation because the money was coming out of the state's rainy day fund. The Legislature and Barbour took $95 million out of the fund during the 2009 budgeting process, leaving it with about $260 million.

Barbour said he would not agree to take any more from the rainy day fund. But in a prepared statement recently, Barbour said the community mental health centers funding woes "can be managed internally by the Department of Mental Health until the Legislature returns in January."

In a prepared statement, Ed LeGrand, executive director of the Department of Mental Health, said, "I am committed to providing as much support as possible to the (community mental health centers) to help them deal with these complex and difficult set of circumstances."

House Appropriations Committee Chairman Johnny Stringer D-Montrose, who was the primary advocate of funding for the centers, said using money from the Department of Mental Health's budget until the 2010 session "will be fine with me as long as they eventually get some money."

The 15 community mental health centers are funded in part by property taxes levied in the counties they serve. They provide an array of services, such as psychiatric outpatient treatment and inpatient drug and alcohol rehabilitation.

Under the current federal matching rate, the centers provide about $25 million and the state provides about $10 million. That money is used to draw down federal Medicaid dollars at a rate of better than 6-1.

That $10 million appropriation is what Barbour vetoed and what will be funded through the budget for the Department of Mental Health.

Smith, of Region III, pointed out that the centers have to provide the bulk of the match to draw down federal Medicaid dollars while the total match is provided by the state for other providers.

Providing that match, he said, consumes 12 percent of his total budget.

The centers are certified and assisted by the Department of Mental Health, but each is governed independently.

LeGrand said the centers are vital to the state's mental health efforts as the emphasis is moving away from institutional care and toward treatment in the communities.

Added Stringer: "If we don't use the centers, it will cost us more for institutional care - three or four times more. Plus it is often better for the clients to receive treatment in the communities."

Nunnelee agreed that the centers are important but said studies are needed to determine why some are more financially sound and can provide multiple services while others are struggling to survive.

"We must come up with a way to make them more uniform," he said.

Contact Bobby Harrison at (601) 353-3119 or bobby.harrison@djournal.com.