Why do we let crazy people kill our children?

To The Eagle:

Any person that shoots a child is CRAZY!!! It’s so simple. The gun didn't wake up one morning and decide it was going to shoot someone, it didn’t aim itself at a child and pull it’s own trigger, a crazy person did!

Crazy people are born every day! We can’t stop that in the foreseeable future. Millions are born with all kinds of problems. We used to put them in institutions, because families couldn't take care of them, local agencies did not have the resources to handle them, and it was more humane than letting them walk the streets. So you ask what has happened to our society over the last 50 years? We all had guns, and there were not many gun laws, people didn't go around and start shooting up places? The first thing that happened was they closed Mental Hospitals and changed who could be placed in them.

When did they close the mental institutions?

"President Reagan signed the Lanterman-Petris-Short Act in 1967, all but ending the practice of institutionalizing patients against their will. Deinstitutionalization began 56 years ago." To save money and thinking it was more humane.

How did deinstitutionalization contribute to the problem of homelessness, more insane people walking the streets?

"The lack of planning for structured living arrangements and for adequate treatment and rehabilitative services in the community has led to many unforeseen consequences such as homelessness, the tendency for many chronic patients to become drifters, and the shunting of many of the mentally ill into the criminal justice system." https://wellbeingport.com/what-happened-to-all-the-mental-institutions/

Unfortunately when the U.S. closed all the hospitals as inhumane it released millions of crazy people onto the streets! This was so stupid.. just like thinking defunding the police will lower crime!

If we take the billions spent on the homeless we can build mental and drug health campuses. Staff them and give dignity back to people. It is inhumane to let the ill people live in a tent on the sidewalk and with no hope for living a full life.

Who elects these idiots, why do we, and our elected remain silent about mental health?

Richard Erickson

Cathlamet