Political Quotes

“I too rise to ask my colleagues to support the Suicide Prevention Lifeline Improvement Act led by my colleague, Mr. Katko. This is a bill that the Mental Health Caucus co-chairs, Mr. Katko and Mrs. Napolitano, and I have been working on for several years. Two years ago, I spent a long afternoon at the local suicide lifeline in northern Virginia. It was fascinating; it was important; and I learned a great deal. Number one, I learned that an awful lot of young people want to do texts rather than phone calls, and they didn't have that capability. I learned that they were in desperate need of more staff. I learned that they needed more volunteers, and when I said that I would like to be a volunteer, I learned that it took four long weekends, then you had to commit to 40 hours of training, and then you had to commit to at least one 4- or 5-hour shift per week for the next year. I also found that it had a remarkable success rate. They said they had talked to something like 3,000 people the previous year. I asked: ``How many had been lost?'' Two out of 3,000. But I also found out that they have wait times sometimes up to 60 minutes just to get on a call. A crisis can't afford to wait 60 minutes, and that is why we developed this legislation to give the lifeline the resources it needs and the quick answering times it has to have to be successful. We also built in oversight capability so it can be more effectively reviewed and improved. It has to constantly evolve.…”