TRENTON – A package of resolutions sponsored by Senators Richard J. Codey and Paul A. Sarlo which would have overturned the Governor’s line-item veto of mental health services in the FY 2012 Budget failed to gain the Republican support needed to override the veto today.
“I think it’s unconscionable and an all-out assault on people with mental illness to let these cuts stand,” said Senator Codey, D-Essex, a longtime champion of mental health care in the Garden State. “Studies have shown that one in five families suffers from mental illness at some point. This is a disease that knows no barriers – whether regional, geographic or demographic. Black, white, Asian, Hispanic, North Jersey, South Jersey – everyone is affected by mental illness, and programs like the ones that the Governor cut through the use of the line-item veto make a difference in everyone’s lives.”