Court-appointed AMHI receiver to advise leadership changes

AUGUSTA – The court-appointed receiver at Augusta Mental Health Institute says leadership changes at the psychiatric hospital are likely, but she is not prepared to go into specifics.

“I’ll be making that recommendation no later than March, probably earlier,” said Elizabeth Jones, who views her $140,000 part-time job at AMHI as a one-year commitment. “I’d like to see a major change effort being implemented by early May, then I want to step back and see what other changes are needed.”

The Maryland woman ran mental health programs and hospitals in other states and helped run the Washington, D.C., mental health system on behalf of another court receiver.

Her future at AMHI rests with the Supreme Judicial Court, which is considering the state’s claim that her appointment unconstitutionally infringes on the authority of the governor and Legislature.

Jones said she has learned much from the direct-care staff and patients she has met on the hospital wards. And she has demanded that the professional and executive staff do the same.

Front-line workers at the hospital are eager for change, she said, prompting her to order increased training. She is pursuing an employee proposal to work out cooperative coverage at the ward level to reduce overtime and job dissatisfaction.

Jones also wants to establish a stronger connection between the hospital and community mental health programs. That would help her move more-difficult patients out of the hospital sooner and help head off future hospitalizations, leaving room for others that need access to AMHI, she said.

Jones believes that hospital administrators must encourage officials to take greater risks in gradual release of patients with violent pasts, particularly those in the hospital Forensic Treatment Unit for the criminally insane, to give those patients some hope of eventual release.

In addition, she is committed to hiring outside organizations that can provide former patients in the hospital – known as peer-support workers – to help current patients work out treatment options and offer an example of success.

AMHI consent decree Court Master Daniel E. Wathen, the state’s former supreme court chief justice, recommended that Superior Court Chief Justice Nancy D. Mills hire Jones as receiver to run the hospital once Mills ordered the hospital into receivership in September.

“I certainly am impressed with her,” Wathen said. “She has tremendous expertise and understanding of the system and very good people skills,” he said.

Jones wasn’t prepared to say whether new money would be needed to pay for the changes she’s expecting to order.

“Maine is generous in what it pays for mental health. We have to look at how we’re spending it before we ask for more,” Jones said. “I don’t think the Legislature wants more generalities about this. They want specifics. And that’s my job, to come up with specifics.”