Tag: Blanca Campos

Reps. LaPointe, Haas Honored for Behavioral Health Leadership

(Springfield, Illinois) – One of Illinois’ top behavioral health advocacy groups honored this week two leading Illinois lawmakers for their “steadfast support” as well as other Illinois behavioral health industry leaders with leadership awards.

The Community Behavioral Health Association of Illinois (CBHA) bestowed its prestigious “2023 Legislator of the Year” award on State Rep. Lindsey LaPointe (D-Chicago) and State Rep. Jackie Haas (R-Kankakee) at the group’s 51st Anniversary and Winter Conference at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Schaumburg on Tuesday, December 4th.

“Representatives LaPointe and Haas’ steadfast support for children, youth, and adults living with mental health or substance use disorders, and their leadership in the General Assembly on behalf of safety-net, behavioral healthcare providers, easily earned the lawmakers our ‘Legislator of the Year’ award,” said Community Behavioral Health Association CEO Blanca Campos. “We are proud to recognize them.”

LaPointe, a social worker, is Chair of the House Mental Health & Addiction Committee and has worked tirelessly to ensure annual mental wellness visits are covered by insurance and to improve the delivery of crisis services among other priorities. Haas, the CEO of the Helen Wheeler Center for Community Mental Health in Kankakee, is the Minority Spokesperson on the House Mental Health & Addiction Committee and has successfully pushed to expand health care, economic opportunity, and early childhood development throughout her community and the state.

In addition to the lawmakers, CBHA also recognized other leaders in the Illinois behavioral health sector.

The Ellen T. Quinn Memorial Award was given to Bernadette May.

May is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and currently serves as the Executive Director of Family Service Association of Greater Elgin. May is a visionary leader who has been instrumental in shaping FSA’s success over the last 10+ years by leading with integrity and by advocating fiercely for children’s mental health. Her unwavering dedication has expanded the agency’s service communities, helping many more children and families receive behavioral health services.

The Frank Anselmo Lifetime Achievement Award was given to Marco Jacome.

Jacome, who is the CEO at Healthcare Alternative Systems, Inc. (H.A.S.), has been working in the field of social services for 45 years. For the last forty years, he has been with H.A.S. and has been serving as the CEO for the last 32 years. From its modest beginnings with just two facilities, H.A.S. has grown to encompass 11 facilities and three colocations. Most recently, H.A.S. opened its 11th facility, a $6 million-dollar, 20,000 square foot, state-of-the-art Community-Based Treatment and Counseling Center in the Austin neighborhood, offering crucial services such as Medication Assisted Recovery, mental health, and substance use services.

The Marvin Lindsey Behavioral Health Innovator Award was given to David T. Jones. 

Jones, who is the State of Illinois’ Chief Behavioral Health Officer, has worked tirelessly to bring innovative models like Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinics (CCBHCs) to Illinois, and is a champion for equity-centered approaches to addressing social drivers of health. A common theme in Chief Jones’ work is a commitment to creative and innovative discussions as a foundation for generating new ideas, solving problems, and fostering collaboration.

The legislators and other honorees received their awards in-person at the Community Behavioral Health Association’s Winter Conference at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Schaumburg on December 4th and 5th.  

Ex-Small Biz Lobbyist Tapped for Mental Health Advocate Post, Funding Push

(Springfield, IL) – A veteran small business lobbyist has been hired to help handle state mental health government affairs for a top Illinois behavioral health advocacy group and to push to reverse state funding cuts opposed by Illinois voters.

Blanca Campos, chief operating officer for advocacy at the Illinois Small Business Advocacy Council (SBAC) from 2010 through 2016, has been recruited by the Community Behavioral Healthcare Association of Illinois to help lead the group’s legislative advocacy in Springfield.

Campos, who earned in Masters of Public Administration from DePaul University in Chicago, will serve as CBHA’s behavioral health care advocate associate, according to the group’s chief.

“With seven years of legislative advocacy experience at the Small Business Advocacy Council, Blanca will significantly boost our advocacy fire power in the General Assembly,” said CBHA CEO Marvin Lindsey. “Blanca will be able to forcefully deliver to lawmakers not only our behavioral health message, but also our small business message that our members our crucial economics cogs in communities.”

During her work at the business group, Campos led the SBAC’s advocacy efforts to bring intrastate equity crowdfunding to Illinois, and helped pass legislation setting a 10% state procurement goal for small businesses. Prior to working for the SBAC, she worked in state legislative and congressional campaigns.

One of the messages that Campos will be delivering to lawmakers is the voting public’s support for greater investment in mental health care and drug treatment services, says Lindsey.

A July 26 automated poll of 826 likely Illinois voters conducted by Illinois Public Opinion Strategies found that 70.1% back “investing more money in mental health care” while just 11.5% support “investing less money” or a net +59 points. 18.4% were undecided.

The poll also found that 55.4% of likely voters support investing more money to “provide treatment to individuals struggling with drug addiction, such as addiction to heroin” and 27.2% support “investing less money.” 17.4% were undecided.

While mental health and drug treatment funding are strongly backed by voters, state funding for both programs has retreated in the last two years.

In Fiscal Year 2016, state addiction treatment contracts issued to community providers, with money coming from the state’s general revenue fund for drug treatment, were cut 25% from FY 2015 levels. Mental health care contracts saw a 21.8% cut. In 2017, addiction treatment contracts had 21.4% reduction and mental health got a 26.7% cut.

“Blanca will help communicate to lawmakers that their constituents want greater financial investment in behavioral healthcare – not less – and that an investment mandate exists for this human services priority,” said Lindsey. “I think that Blanca will be effective in delivering that message.”

Beyond her business background, Campos has also served on the Women’s Health Awareness Council, a collaborative program coordinated by the Women’s Health Initiative at Swedish Covenant Hospital in partnership with more than 30 elected officials, community leaders, major philanthropies and respected health care providers.

mlindsey@cbha.net