WISCONSIN UNITED
for MENTAL HEALTH

Healthiest Wisconsin 2010:
A Partnership Plan to Improve the Health of the Public
from the Executive Summary:

Definition of Public Health: a system, a social enterprise, whose focus is on the population as a whole. The public health system seeks to extend the benefits of current knowledge in ways that will have a maximum impact on the health status of the entire population in several key areas:

• Prevent injury, illness and the spread of disease.
• Create a healthful environment and protect against environmental hazards.
• Promote and engage healthy behaviors and promote mental health.
• Respond to disasters and assist communities in recovery.
• Promote accessible, high quality health services.

Vision: A healthy Wisconsin is a place where ...

• all individuals reach their highest potential.
• communities support the physical, emotional, mental, spiritual, and cultural needs of all people.
• people work together to create healthy, sustainable physical and social environments for their benefit and that of future generations.

For more information go the the official Turning Point homepage at the Wisconsin Department of Health Services

Governor's Blue Ribbon Commission on Mental Health

Vision: All persons in need of mental health services across Wisconsin have equal access to resources that strengthen self-determination and self-sufficiency by promoting health and wellness, improvement and recovery, quality of life and dignity.

History of the Blue Ribbon Commission
Appointed by Governor Tommy Thompson in May 1996, this commission was charged to examine the mental health delivery system and the principle of a state/county partnership; the mental health services provided for children, adolescents, adults and elderly; and the impact of stigma on community perceptions and current mental health policy. The group was directed to recommend a service system targeted at prevention, early intervention, treatment, recovery, and positive consumer outcomes.

The 40-member commission included five mental health consumers, three family members of persons with mental illness, four legislators, representatives from the county human services system, mental health provider groups, state bureaucrats responsible for programs serving persons with mental illness, as well as other stakeholders. The Commission met monthly from June 1996 until February 1997. It created two working committees to facilitate its work: the Prevention and Early Intervention and the Treatment and Recovery Committees.

The Commission finalized its report in April 1997 and presented it to the Governor later that year. The Governor accepted the recommendations of the report. Impressively, unlike some Commission reports, this one has not sat on a shelf collecting dust. The Department of Health and Family Services has moved ahead in many areas to implement the report recommendations, in the report including developing managed care demonstration projects to explore the feasibility of modifying the manner in which public mental health services are financed, moving ahead with efforts to incorporate a recovery philosophy as the basis for the public mental health system, and allocating funds to begin the work of incorporating prevention and early intervention practices into the public mental health system.