The 1999 US Supreme Court decision in Olmstead v. L.C. stated that mental illness was a disability covered under the Americans with Disabilities Act, requiring that all governmental agencies, not just the state hospitals, were required to make “reasonable accommodations” to move people with mental illness into community-based treatment to end unnecessary institutionalization.5 The shift was especially pronounced among children and youth: by 2009, the institutionalized population had declined by 98 percent.6
