Community Mental Health Services

Advocacy

Adult Mental Health Advocacy

The Advocacy Alliance believes that people who experience mental illness are best served when acting as their own spokesperson. We ensure that the focus of treatment, housing and employment is based on a person’s own individual needs for recovery.

The Advocacy Alliance’s advocates include Certified Peer Specialists and other mental health professionals who work in communities, at Clarks Summit State Hospital, in community adult psychiatric in-patient units, and follow former Allentown State hospital patients.

Child and Family Mental Health Advocacy

Our advocates, including Family Peer Advocates, work with families of children who have emotional or behavioral disorders. Our advocates ensure that families’ voices are heard and included in ongoing dialogues on the regional, state, and federal level, the resulting policies of which affect children and their families.

Consumer/Family Satisfaction Teams

The Advocacy Alliance facilitates recovery and resilience focused teams whose expressed purpose is to assess adults’ and adolescents’ levels of satisfaction with the services they receive, to inquire about their wants and needs, and to learn what they think would help in the delivery of their services.

The Advocacy Alliance has Consumer/Family Satisfaction teams in the following counties: Lackawanna/Susquehanna, Luzerne/Wyoming, Carbon/Monroe/Pike, Schuylkill, Wayne, Tioga, Columbia/Montour/Snyder/Union, Huntington/Mifflin/Juniata and Centre counties. The Advocacy Alliance has the capability to expand these services to other counties as requested.

Support Groups

The Advocacy Alliance facilitates a variety support groups throughout the month. Please see our list below to see if one of our support groups would meet your needs.

Depression and Bipolar Support Group

This support group is for adults living with Depression or Bipolar illness for mutual direction and encouragement in a confidential and supportive setting. The group meets every Monday from 6:00 PM to 7:00 PM at the Recovery Center, 825 Jefferson Avenue, Scranton, PA 18510. 

Peer to Peer Services

The Advocacy Alliance conducts peer to peer interviews for those receiving services at Clark Summit State Hospital (CSSH) in the following Counties: Lackawanna/Susquehanna, Luzerne/Wyoming, Carbon/Monroe/Pike, Wayne, Tioga, Bradford, and Wyoming Counties. The assessment tool is to be filled out only by an interviewer who is a self-disclosed consumer of mental health services. Primary responsibilities include: conduct peer to peer interviews for those receiving services at CSSH from the aforementioned counties; present peer to peer assessments to persons responsible for coordination of Community Support Plan; attend Community Support Plan meetings. The Advocacy Alliance has the capability to expand these services to other counties as requested.

Community Support Program

The Community Support Program (CSP) is a coalition of mental health consumers of services, family members, advocates and professionals who work together to ensure quality mental health services in the community. CSPs accomplish this through advocacy, education and the elimination of stigma and discrimination. Members of the local CSP committees participate in the activities, which are designed to heighten awareness about mental illness and improve the quality of life for consumers. By promoting such activities, the CSP helps individuals gain confidence, self-esteem and independence in the community.

As Northeast Pennsylvania Regional Coordinator for CSP, the Advocacy Alliance’s goal is to educate and assist local communities in improving opportunities and services for persons involved with mental health or substance issues. The CSP envisions a service delivery system which will provide a flexible array of appropriate and creative opportunities and services responsive to individual need.

  • The Northeast Pennsylvania Regional CSP meets on the 3rd Tuesday of each month from 10:00 AM – 1:00 PM at the Recovery Center, 825 Jefferson Avenue, Scranton, PA 18510.
  • The Lackawanna County CSP Lackawanna County CSP meets the third Wednesday of each month from 1:00 P.M. to 2:00 P.M. at the Recovery Center, 825 Jefferson Avenue, Scranton, PA 18510.
  • The Carbon County CSP meets on the 3rd Thursday of each month at 11:00 AM at the Advocacy Alliance, 460 South Seventh Street, Lehighton, PA 18235.
  • The Monroe County CSP meets on the 4th Friday of each month at 11:00 AM at the Carbon/Monroe/Pike MH/DD Program, 730 A Phillip Street, Stroudsburg, PA 18301.
  • The Pike County CSP meets every other month (January, March, May, July, September, November) at 10:00 AM at New Visions, 117 Pike County Blvd., Hawley, PA 18428.
  • The Schuylkill County CSP meets on the 2nd Tuesday of each month at 12:30 PM at the Hidden River Clubhouse, 1935 West Market Street, Pottsville, PA 17901.
  • The Columbia/Montour/Snyder/Union CSP meets on the 3rd Wednesday of each month at 1:00 PM at Recovery Central, 675 Locust Street, Bloomsburg, PA 17815.

CSP Guiding Principles

1. Consumer-Centered/ Empowered

Services are based upon the needs of the individual and incorporate self-help and other approaches that allow consumers to retain the greatest possible control over their lives.

2. Culturally Competent

Services are sensitive and responsive to racial, ethnic, religious, and gender differences of consumers and families.

3. Meets Special Needs

Services are designed to meet the needs of persons with mental illness who are also affected by such factors as old age, substance abuse, physical illness or disability, developmental disability, homelessness or involvement with the criminal justice system.

4. Community-Based / Natural Supports

Services are provided in the least coercive manner and in the most natural setting as possible. Consumers are encouraged to use the natural supports in the community and to integrate into the living, working, learning and leisure activities of the community.

5. Flexible

Services are designed to allow people to move in and out of the system and within the system as needed.

6. Coordinated

Services and supports are coordinated on both the local system level and on individual consumer basis in order to reduce fragmentation and to improve efficiency and effectiveness with service delivery. Coordination includes linkages with consumers, families, advocates and professionals at every level of the system of care.

7. Accountable

Service providers are accountable to the users of services and include consumers and families in development, implementation, monitoring and evaluation services.

8. Strengths Based

Services are built upon the assets and strengths of consumers and help people maintain a sense of identity, self-esteem and dignity.

Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA)

The goal of CASA is to prevent abused, neglected, and abandoned children from languishing in an inappropriate group or foster home. We work tirelessly to match a CASA volunteer with a child to find them safe, permanent homes as soon as possible.

CASA volunteers are appointed by judges, in a court order, to watch over and advocate for abused and neglected children, to make sure they don’t get lost in the overburdened legal and social service system. For many children, their CASA volunteer will be the one constant adult presence.

What CASA Volunteers Do

Once assigned to a case, the CASA volunteer reviews court, school, medical, and caseworker records. The CASA volunteer talks with everyone involved, including parents, foster parents, school officials, healthcare providers, and, most importantly, the child.

The CASA volunteer then provides the judge with a factual written report to help the court make a well-informed, timely decision about that child’s future. During the life of a case, a CASA volunteer monitors the child’s situation to make sure he or she remains safe.

Studies show that children with a CASA volunteer:

  • Are more likely to secure needed services in a timely manner.
  • Are moved from placement to placement less frequently.
  • Are more likely to have their case reviewed regularly by the court.
  • Have a better chance of living in a safe, permanent home.

For more information about CASA, please go to www.lackawannacountycasa.org.

Recovery Center

The Recovery Center is where persons receiving mental health services come together in an atmosphere of mutual support for individual recovery. The Center offers members an environment where they can enhance and expand activities of self advocacy such as Peer Specialists Programs, Mental Health Advanced Directives, and Community Support Programs, as well as develop and implement educational programs on issues relating to mental wellness and recovery.

Members of the Recovery Center must be eighteen (18) years of age or older. Members are required to complete a brief demographic sheet, which includes identification of their mental health providers and an emergency contact.

The Recovery Center is located 825 Jefferson Avenue, Scranton, PA 18510. Hours of Operation are:

  • Monday: 10:00 AM – 2:00 PM
  • Tuesday: 10:00 AM – 2:00 PM
  • Wednesdays: 10:00 AM – 2:00 PM
  • Thursdays: 10:00 AM – 2:00 PM
  • Fridays: 10:00 AM – 2:00 PM
  • Saturdays: 10:00 AM – 2:00 PM
  • Sundays: Closed