Choate workers’ union files lawsuit to block state from gutting mental health facility

ANNA — The labor union representing hundreds of employees at Choate Mental Health and Developmental Center has filed a lawsuit challenging the state’s planned downsizing of the facility, arguing Gov. JB Pritzker’s administration failed to follow state laws governing reductions in healthcare services, the closure of state facilities and the preservation of psychiatric beds.

The Illinois Department of Human Services announced to staff in late July that it planned to significantly reduce staffing and beds for patients with mental illness and developmental disabilities.

As of Aug. 1, Choate had 75 mental health beds and 150 beds for individuals with developmental disabilities. The state’s plan calls for eliminating all psychiatric beds and all but 40 beds for individuals with developmental disabilities. Those 40 beds would be reserved for forensic patients who are typically admitted through the courts after being found unfit to stand trial in criminal proceedings.

The state’s planned downsizing would eliminate about half of Choate’s roughly 500 workers, with most represented by the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees.

AFSCME Council 31 filed the lawsuit Tuesday in Union County Circuit Court, joined as plaintiffs by Union County State’s Attorney Tyler Tripp and AFSCME Local 141 President Tina Winfield. The lawsuit names the state of Illinois, Pritzker, IDHS and IDHS Secretary Dulce Quintero as defendants.

Local government bodies in southern Illinois also have passed or are expected to pass formal resolutions opposing the cuts in services and the elimination of hundreds of jobs at Choate.

The AFSCME lawsuit alleges violations of three state laws and asks a judge to block the state from moving forward with key portions of the downsizing.

First, AFSCME alleges IDHS violated the Health Facilities Planning Act by failing to obtain a permit or exemption before eliminating Choate’s general developmental disability and mental health operations. The union argues the changes substantially alter the scope and operation of the facility and reduce its bed capacity enough to trigger the law’s requirements.

The lawsuit also alleges violations of the Illinois State Facilities Closure Act. Although the Choate campus would not fully close, AFSCME argues the law’s mandates are triggered by plans to shutter the psychiatric hospital and general residential program for people with developmental disabilities, and that the state has taken no steps to comply with the closure act.

Finally, AFSCME alleges the state’s plan violates the Mental Health Inpatient Facility Access Act, passed in 2022 amid a shortage of publicly funded psychiatric services. The law prohibits further reductions in state-operated inpatient mental health bed capacity, with limited exceptions.

The Pritzker administration has said the need for mental health beds is greater in northern Illinois and plans to phase out Choate’s 75 civil psychiatric beds by March while adding beds at Madden Mental Health Center near Chicago.

But AFSCME argues the state has begun moving patients out of Choate without first adding enough state-operated psychiatric beds elsewhere and that moving capacity north would severely reduce access to inpatient psychiatric care in southern Illinois.

The lawsuit asks the court to prevent the state from eliminating Choate’s psychiatric operation and to require IDHS to maintain 75 inpatient psychiatric beds there until it creates 75 additional beds at other state-operated mental health centers. It also seeks to block layoffs tied to the psychiatric closure until those replacement beds are created.

The union also accuses the administration of abruptly reversing course after years of assurances about Choate’s future.

In 2023, when the state announced a three-year “transformation” of Choate, state officials told union representatives the plan did not include closing the facility or laying off workers, according to the complaint. In 2024, the state announced an expansion of mental health services at Choate, and as recently as the budgeting process for the current fiscal year, DHS officials assured state and union representatives that the budget did not “contemplate any layoffs,” the lawsuit alleges.

Then, on July 23, just weeks after the new fiscal year began, the state announced plans to end Choate’s general developmental disability operation by Sept. 30 and phase out its mental health operation by March.

“DHS never explained what had changed and why it reversed course,” the lawsuit alleges, accusing the state of beginning “an unseemly rush to transfer residents of the facilities to other placements.”

“AFSCME members who work at Choate care about the individuals they support and are committed to the mental health and disability services they provide,” AFSCME Council 31 Executive Director Roberta Lynch said in a statement. “Southern Illinois needs these services, and state laws exist to protect them. That’s why we’re asking the court to step in.”

Second lawsuit filed challenging the closing

The AFSCME case is the second lawsuit filed since the state announced the downsizing in July.

Earlier this month, Tripp, the Union County state’s attorney, filed a separate lawsuit in Union County Circuit Court along with Sheriff David Wilkins and Justin Emrick, the legal guardian of a Choate resident. That case was subsequently moved to U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Illinois, where it was moved at the request of the state defendants.

That earlier lawsuit raises some of the same claims about the loss of psychiatric beds, but its claims are broader than the AFSCME-led lawsuit filed this week and also alleges violations of federal law.

The lawsuit alleges that criminal defendants in southern Illinois have routinely remained in county jails for weeks while awaiting state psychiatric placements, and that reducing Choate’s capacity would worsen an already strained system. It seeks a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction to prevent the elimination of Choate’s psychiatric beds and its remaining general developmental disability beds while the case proceeds.

Among the records attached to the lawsuit is a July letter from IDHS to a Union County judge demanding placement of a defendant who the state had determined needed psychiatric care at Choate. That letter asked for the judge’s patience while the state awaited an opening. The letter said there were 217 people statewide waiting for admission to the state’s forensic treatment programs, while another 109 were awaiting evaluations to determine whether inpatient admission was necessary.

The case also raises federal constitutional and disability-rights claims and includes an individual challenge brought by Emrick on behalf of his ward, identified in court filings as J.B., a Choate resident. Emrick objects to the state’s plan to transfer J.B. to Murray Developmental Center in Centralia. Emrick said that having to travel farther to visit J.B. would interfere with his care.

The federal Fourteenth Amendment and Americans with Disabilities Act claims in the lawsuit allowed the state defendants to move the case from Union County Circuit Court to federal court.

An IDHS spokesperson said the agency does not comment on pending litigation.

Pritzker has defended the decision to reduce operations at Choate, pointing to longstanding problems at the facility. In a yearslong investigation that began in 2022, Capitol News Illinois and ProPublica documented a culture of abuse and coverup at the facility that had persisted for years despite numerous calls for reforms. In response, Pritzker’s administration announced a series of reform plans, though intended to keep the facility open.

Speaking to reporters in southern Illinois in late August, Pritzker said he’d hoped to resolve the challenges there but made clear several years ago that if that didn’t happen “the only option that we really would have is to stand down on that facility.”

Capitol News Illinois is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news service that distributes state government coverage to hundreds of news outlets statewide. It is funded primarily by the Illinois Press Foundation and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation.