Promoting Community Involvement in Deinstitutionalization Planning: The Experience in One Community

The presence of large numbers of former mental patients in the community has forced municipal governments to become aware of the deinstitutionalization process. Many, such as in Asbury, Park, New Jersey, have voiced strong criticism of the process and have resisted the influx of patients. In 1979 the city was selected by the state mental health authority to work with the Urban Health Institute, a nonprofit health care consulting firm, in a project designed to encourage local planning and resource development for deinstitutionalized mental patients. The authors describe how the project, using traditional community organizing techniques, worked to reduce conflict and to create an atmosphere in which positive local planning for these patients became possible.