Mental-health counseling for Florida bankruptcy filers

Recently, the Orlando Division of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court's Middle District of Florida for the first time began displaying pamphlets for free or reduced cost mental-health counseling and other services. It’s important that people dealing with the stresses of bankruptcy are aware of the emotional and mental-health resources available for them in their communities.

There is no doubt that difficult financial times lead to emotional troubles. Two months ago in Orlando a young father was fatally shot and five others wounded in a downtown office building. The shooter in the incident was struggling with unemployment and was recently ruled incompetent to stand trial. In another incident just weeks earlier, a man charged with fatally shooting his wife in their Isleworth home was also facing foreclosure and the bankruptcy of his company. These extreme cases illustrate the emotional distress that is tied to personal financial turmoil brought by the recession.

People facing bankruptcy may have lost their health insurance and likely think they cannot afford mental-health counseling and other services. The pamphlets encourage using the United Way’s 211 line, which offers 24-hour crises and suicide counseling. Free or reduced cost services which help with issues ranging from mental-health to housing concerns are also referenced.

The effort to display the pamphlets was led by U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Arthur Briskman, who is on the bench in Orlando: "the awareness and availability of professional counseling is beneficial with the significant increase of economic pressures on our fellow citizens.” Briskman plans to make the information available on the court’s web site as well.

According to Briskman, Orlando, which has the highest rate of increases in bankruptcy filings in the state's Middle District, is indicative of the region’s large portion of middle-to-lower income people who are employed hourly and whose incomes have been reduced by the housing bust. In 2009 bankruptcy filings increased 59 percent in Orlando, 42 percent in Tampa, and 32 percent in Jacksonville.

The pamphlets demonstrate a significant first step to helping the people affected, and I hope that bankruptcy filers will utilize the resources available to them.