Francine Way works as a money manager, but hers is not a typical client base. She works on the second floor of the Village – a mental health center in downtown Long Beach that specializes in individualized treatment and life counseling for people suffering from severe and persistent mental illnesses – where she counsels people on how to survive on an extremely limited income. 

Francine Way, money manager at the Village

As soon as she walked back into the friendly office Thursday afternoon after a meeting, a woman – one of her clients – rushed up and confronted her about some money she was expecting to receive from the government. Way told her the money would be available Friday. As the client grew more frustrated, she started to yell at the top of her lungs.

“Where’s my motherfucking check?” the woman shouted in the middle of the office.

Way – a lady with long pink hair from her punk rock days and gold, revolver pistol-shaped earrings – calmly stood still and listened. People around them either kept going about their business in the office or glanced over curiously as the woman’s yelling grew louder and her voice quickened.

“I need to pay my fucking rent!”

The money that those with mental illnesses receive from Social Security must go through a money manager if it is determined that the person is not yet capable of budgeting their own funds. Way is one of the people who helps with this process.

Of the 125-or-so people who come to Way’s team at the Village for financial services, about 40 of them are required by Social Security to do so. Money is tight for people with severe mental illnesses, many of whom can’t work or can’t find work, especially during this period of high unemployment.

Things will get even harder under Gov. Jerry Brown’s budget, which includes cuts to not only mental health services but also the supplemental income on which many survive. The Brown budget, which zaps $12.5 billion in state spending, includes brutal reductions in social services, like the $1.7 billion cut to Medi-Cal.

The proposal also involves shifting responsibility for mental health care projects from the state to the individual counties, so it’s difficult to predict how far the total funding will drop. But local facilities are bracing for trouble.

Most interactions with the people who take part in the Village’s financial services are tranquil. Sometimes, though, tempers can flare up. In this case, Village representatives had told the woman that her check would arrive and be available for pickup on Friday. Her apartment manager told her a different story. She came in on Thursday in a fury.

“She wasn’t able to distinguish between the two entities,” Way said after the woman had been calmly escorted outside by a couple of the Village staffers.

“It’s always something interesting,” said an intern from Cal State Long Beach.

When such outbursts occur, Way said, you just have to take yourself out of the situation. It’s all about empathy.

“I think we’re the most hated people here,” she said.

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Way has been working in mental health for 20 years. She started in a small facility in a gang-ridden part of Santa Ana. Before that, she was a hairdresser. She has kept her hair some shade of bright red or pink since her forties.

A clutch-sized dog – a long-haired teacup Chihuahua – crawls around her desk as she speaks with patients, to whom all Village staffers refer as “members.” The dog has a way of putting people at ease. “She’s a good tool,” Way said.

“If someone were managing my money and I couldn’t get complete hold of it, I’d be a little pissed, especially if I wanted it for something. So part of it’s trying to ease them into it as much as possible and also allowing people to be frustrated that they have to have a payee. They don’t want this to be happening at all.”

Some members are homeless, some are in housing and some live in motels. Many receive supplemental security income from Social Security. The standard monthly payments total $845, which will be cut to $830 under Gov. Jerry Brown’s recent budget proposal. California has been shaving these payments down since 2009, when payments shrunk from $907 to $870.

“The members have been able to survive each hit,” Way said.

The Village will need to kick up support and prepare the members for the changes. About 40 percent of the members who receive payments are required to go through a money manager, said Dave Pilon, CEO of Mental Health America of Los Angeles, which runs this facility and others.

“You kind of get a feel, almost immediately, for what their capabilities are,” she said. “I’m pretty clear that the money is specifically for shelter, food and clothes. So when they start saying, ‘Oh, but I owe so-and-so this amount, and I need to get this and I need to get that and I really need all the money at once,’ you start thinking, ‘Maybe they’re not capable of budgeting a large amount at one time.’”

So, taking it one step at a time, she coaches them through paying their rent, paying their bills and paying for food. Some members haven’t been grocery shopping in years, so the Village can give them grocery cards to encourage them to spend the money on food.

“After rent’s paid, a lot of times, there’s not a lot of money for food or extra stuff, so it’s really about making that money spread out.”

In Long Beach, especially, rent takes a huge chunk out of the check. A cheap apartment in Long Beach is about $600-675 a month – without utilities. The Village is lucky in some respects because they have access to subsidized housing services for those who meet the criteria for homelessness or history of homelessness. They also have a team of people who help members find affordable shelter.

“A lot of the people who come to the Village are coming here straight from the hospital or from prison, so they’re coming here pretty much with just the clothes on their backs,” said Amber Anderson, a social worker at the Village. “They need to get financial help, they need to apply for Social Security, they need clothes, they need affordable housing – all that crisis stuff they need taking care of.”

For one member, who also has severe diabetes, it’s a struggle to get by and stay healthy, Way said. After rent and utilities, she has about $31 left over for food. The Village is fortunate because its funding allows the staffers to take extra steps to help her through Meals on Wheels or other food assistance programs. Most mental health centers don’t have those resources.

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LaTonya Washing, 51, has been coming to the Village for help since 1996. Way hired her to do filing, sorting and other work around the office. Her rent is $185, her bills run around $150 and she gets $200 for food. Her work helps supplement her living expenses.

“It is a struggle, but it’s well worth it, ‘cause I haven’t had full-time work in 10 years. The longest I worked a full-time job was six months, and I had to take off because there was no one to watch my children.”

She is one of the members who has weathered the cuts to Social Security and mental health services in recent years. “It affects everything, but you just keep a good attitude and pull out of it,” she said.

The stated goal of the money management program, though, is to get people to build the skills to manage their money on their own. About ten members graduate form the program each year.

The Village also offers temporary work to members like Washington who want to supplement their income and develop more advanced personal management skills. Once the members start becoming more independent, the Village has to train them about opening bank accounts and avoiding overdrawing through easy debit card swipes.

Way said the work Washington does actually has therapeutic value because it can get her mind off her problems and give her something to focus on. “She is able to identify what a benefit this is for her, so she’s very clear that it makes her feel better.”

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