Friends,
Every single day I am amazed by the amount of information being presented to us in Carson City, and one of the issues that I have found most interesting is our mental health system. I strongly believe that we have the money for these programs; we need to cut the waste and restructure existing budgets to get the mentally ill the appropriate medical treatment they need.
Over the last couple of weeks the Assembly Judiciary Committee has heard testimony from various state departments regarding mental health, and I have to tell you that I'm concerned with what I've heard.
On February 7th Greg Cox, the Director of the Nevada Department of Corrections, shared with us that there was a movement away from mental health facilities in the 1980s that has caused our prison system to take on many individuals who would be better served in a facility with better mental care.
On February 13th Julie Butler, the Records Bureau Manager for Nevada's Department of Public Safety, who oversees the records for Nevada background checks, shared with us the extent of the challenges she faces in getting agencies to report in a timely manner. Since 2007 65,000 records have been misplaced and were recently found that documented mental illnesses or could clear people waiting on background checks to get a job.
These are scary issues, and I feel that we have done a major disservice to our neighbors who need help with their mental illnesses by blaming the 2nd Amendment rather than looking at the real problem. In the case of Sandy Hook, Carson IHOP, Columbine and the countless other mass shootings, each of the shooters had a few things in common. All of the shooters were suffering from a mental illness; none of these shooters had their concealed weapon permit nor did they use a weapon they had legally obtained. Gun control does not stop gun violence.
Since arriving in Carson City, I've been actively asking questions and looking for common sense solutions to these issues. I'm confident that, with my fellow Republican and Democrat peers, we can solve these problems together.
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Yours truly,
Michele Fiore
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