Res. No. 8 Title Resolution condemning the Republicans in the United States House of Representatives for rejecting a United States Senate proposal to eliminate disparities in insurance coverage for mental and physical illnesses, and calling upon the House of Representatives to consider this issue again in the current session and address one of the most salient civil rights issues of our time by adopting a mental health parity requirement. Body By Council Members Moskowitz, DeBlasio, Liu, McMahon, Monserrate and Quinn; also Council Members Gioia, Lopez, Seabrook, Serrano and Clarke Whereas, United States Senator Pete Domenici, Republican of New Mexico, proposed a mental health parity requirement to the annual appropriations bill for the Departments of Health and Human Services, Education and Labor; and Whereas, Mental health parity would require health plans and insurance companies to provide equivalent coverage, or parity, for mental and physical illnesses; and Whereas, This measure would have extended coverage to millions of Americans who suffer from mental illness but are not entitled to coverage because of widespread limits on treatment for psychiatric disorders; and Whereas, The Senate approved this proposal in October 2001, thus opening the way for mental health parity to be included in the final form of the appropriations bill written by a team of negotiators from both branches of the United States Congress; and Whereas, Mental health parity was not included in the final form of the appropriations bill because the House Republican negotiators defeated its adoption on a party-line vote of 10 to 7; and Whereas, Every Republican in the House negotiating team voted against mental health parity and every Democrat voted for it; now, therefore, be it Resolved, That the Council of the City of New York condemns the Republicans in the United States House of Representatives for rejecting a United States Senate proposal to eliminate disparities in insurance coverage for mental and physical illnesses, and calls upon the House of Representatives to consider this issue again in the current session and address one of the most salient civil rights issues of our time by adopting a mental health parity requirement. |10
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