John Nutting

Bob Staples, who you met before, and I just finished going to Augusta.

In fact, we had the final vote today on LD 1989, an act to increase access to the progressive treatment plan legal fund, because last year, the Attorney General suddenly announced they weren't going to represent

all of the PTP hearings in front of our judges.

And so it left families really in alerts that if they couldn't afford an attorney themselves, a loved one was not going to extend.

It is for a one-year term with one-year extensions at a time if they have a district court judge agree to it.

Well, I think there has to be

more communication both ways.

And it's better than it used to be.

But we've had one group in Maine that has fought us on this subject for 23, actually 24 years now, the Disability Rights Center, that don't like anything like this.

It's their right to be psychotic.

They shouldn't have their rights taken away by a court order and, you know, blah, blah, blah, like that.

And of course, three quarters of schizophrenics in Maine

Maybe 50% of bipolar have awareness themselves.

They don't have this anosognosia, lack of awareness.

And they, the groups against AOT and against the PTP plan in Maine, seem to have this thought that nobody has anosognosia, lack of awareness, and nobody needs a court order.

And of course, that's not the case.

We have the right not to pay taxes.

millions and millions of dollars to keep people in jails and hospitals all their lives after they commit a crime because we didn't help them with their lack of awareness by keeping them on a treatment plan.

You take the young man in Westbrook last year that killed the young parents in front of their children in their car.

He had been on a PTP plan and was off his treatment plan.