May 11--As the mother of an adult son with mental illness, Irene LaChapelle understands feeling frustrated by "the system."

While her son, Jeremy, would only receive up to a 50 percent reimbursement for health-care costs, LaChapelle said insurance companies routinely covered as much as 80 percent of health-care costs for those with other serious illnesses.

A decade's worth of working as an advocate and lobbyist for change in the county, state and national offices of National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI) helped bring about change.

In 2001, the state legislature passed reform that helped narrow the disparity between insurance coverage for the mentally ill and coverage for those with other serious illnesses.

"We fought a lot of battles and got tired at times, but (NAMI of Iredell) has been a great source of information and a very positive way to work out my anger at my son's mental illness," LaChapelle said.

The battle isn't over. LaChapelle says she sees care for the mentally ill shrinking at the state level.

"You're supposed to have a bridge level of funding coming down from the state level to the local level, and it's just not getting here. It's just disappearing," she said. "And if you don't have any funding for mental health care programs, you're letting our most vulnerable folks down. In the end, we all are our brother's keeper."

Crossroads Behavioral Healthcare dispenses state funds on the local level to help people receive mental health services through 120 local and regional service providers, said CEO David Swann. "We have a fixed amount of money on the state level, and when there is no Medicare or Medicaid, we authorize behavioral health services," he said.

He said one way to get better funding for mental health programs is to lobby the legislature.

The state NAMI organization has been hosting local mental health advocacy groups in Raleigh.

State funding for additional hospital beds closer to home is a high priority due to those who are battling mental illness having to travel further from home to receive treatment.

"There's so much related to dollars and policy things, it's hard to educate people on everything," Swann said. "In the area of advocacy, (NAMI of Iredell) can have a huge influence over the legislature by lending their personal voice and stories to the mental health care issue," Swann said.

That's why NAMI of Iredell is making a trip to Raleigh on May 21 to speak with state lawmakers about proposed policies for the North Carolina mental health system.

Up until 2005, former NAMI of Iredell County Affiliate President Dottie Harrison helped lead the local charge before becoming seriously ill herself. For a while, local efforts stalled.

"(Dottie) put in her time," LaChapelle said. "In the years before she got sick, she would sometimes put 40,000 miles a year on her vehicle while going to and from Raleigh and attending workshops."

Mary Powers has since taken on the role of NAMI of Iredell president.

"The state has adopted reform; now it's just patching the reform," Powers told a room of some 35 new NAMI of Iredell members in April. "We just basically want to get our hands in there again to find something that works for our people in need who are mentally ill."

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