CHARG Resource Center
"Partners for Change"

"The mission of CHARG Resource Center is to advance a model of genuine partnership among individuals who live with mental illness, mental health professionals, and the larger community through respectful comprehensive services."

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Capitol Hill, Denver Colorado

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 The Drop-In Center

The CHARG Drop-In Center is open to any person with a major mental illness, regardless of where they live or receive treatment. It serves approximately 500 unduplicated individuals per year. Every day during the week mental health consumers can visit the center and participate as much as they wish in its ongoing activities. Some of these activities include support groups, life skills groups (cooking, shopping, etc.), art groups, recreational outings and seasonal events. The Drop-In Center provides hot coffee and snacks free of charge, and an inexpensive ($1.00) hot lunch is offered on Tuesdays.

Drop-In Center visitors can also use one of the Center's donated computers for word processing, writing resumes and communicating with others via the Internet. Telephones and newspapers are available for those who may not have these readily available in their boarding homes, apartments, or shelters. Mental health consumers also use the Drop-In Center to meet with vocational counselors and consumer advocates.

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Dental and Eye Care

CHARG Resource Center has a track record of targeting needs of persons with mental illness which are unmet by any other agency or program. One of the most significant of these is dental and eye care. Routine dental and eye care is not a funded benefit of Medicaid or Medicare, which are the only providers of health insurance generally available to this population.

CHARG Resource Center has responded to these needs by instituting a Dental and Eye Care Program. We will pay for necessary dental and eye care for our clients, or assist them in obtaining free treatment if it is available. We ask the client to agree to pay back the cost of treatment over an extended time period, as they are able to do so. In this manner, expenses are more often than not paid back into the fund, thus becoming available to help the next person in need.

Several years ago CHARG started the "Smart Mouths" Program. This project grew from our recognition that our overall goal of promoting optimum oral health among mental health consumers requires more than simply facilitating and financing visits to the dentist. The project entails classes in oral hygiene in addition to regular preventative check-ups and care. On the first and third Monday of the month, dental hygienist Cherry Jelm teaches an oral hygiene group. After completing two classes, participants receive a battery-operated toothbrush and become eligible to receive services through our Dental and Eye care program. For more information, contact Margie Carlin or Peggy Daniel at #303-830-8805.

The Heartland Clinic

This outpatient clinic provides intensive services to 40-50 chronically mentally ill people. The clinic staff includes a part-time psychiatrist, a full-time psychiatric nurse, 1 full-time therapist, 2 part-time therapists, a recreational therapist and student interns.

Services provided to consumers include individual counseling, group counseling and medication management. Through the clinic, the nurses and social workers work alongside consumers to help them maintain an independent lifestyle


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Community Education

Both CHARG Resource Center staff and consumers actively work in the community to educate the public about mental illness. In particular, mental health consumer speakers from CHARG have spoken about mental illness in front of a variety of audiences of all sizes, from church groups and college classes to workshops and conferences.

Beginning in 2003, CHARG Resource Center collaborates with several other mental health consumer and professional organizations on our annual Innovations in Mental Health conference. Our partners include WE-CAN! (the statewide Colorado mental health consumers' organization), the Mental Health Association of Colorado, the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill – Colorado Chapter, the Federation of Families For Children's Mental Health – Colorado Chapter, the Mental Health Ombuds Program of Colorado and Starfish II, LLC.

Prior to the first annual Innovations in Mental Health conference in 2003, CHARG hosted an annual mental health conference that was also designed to stimulate creative thinking and foster interaction between consumers, professionals, family members, and the community.

Consumer Advocacy

Based at the drop-in center, mental health consumer advocates keep track of legislation that will affect people with a mental illness, answer emergency calls for information about the rights of people in treatment, and distribute information about mental illness into the community. They also work with their mentally ill peers to assist them in accessing needed services, and have often become involved in finding them shelter or more permanent housing.

CHARG Resource Center co-founded CART (the Coalition for the Advancement of Rights in Treatment), which brings together mental health consumers and concerned advocates to influence policy development in the public mental health arena. CART provides a newsletter to its members and other interested persons. At their meetings and through their newsletter, CART's members provide information about legislation that is relevant to the mentally ill and what steps to take to be heard.


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PATH Homeless Outreach Project

This project is a cooperative interagency program which involves CHARG in partnership with the Colorado Coalition for the homeless, and with active involvement of several other homeless-serving agencies. It is an outreach program which addresses the needs of homeless persons who are mentally ill. The project employs one professional case manager/project coordinator who makes outreach visits to homeless shelters and homeless-serving agencies, and seeks out those homeless mentally ill persons who are in places unfit for habitation. Clients are assisted in accessing housing, income support and mental health treatment and services. The coordinator also supervises the project's consumer case management staff.

The two half-time consumer case managers operate as non-threatening peers who have experienced similar problems and who have also had to negotiate systems from inside, which helps to decrease suspicion of "professionals" or "agency people." They assist the professional staff of the project in delivering needed services to the homeless clients.

Miscellaneous Activities

The CHARG van is available to take interested mental health consumers on regularly scheduled trips to recreational sites and events in Denver and the nearby mountains.

At the main building at 709 E. 12th Avenue , clients participate in gardening activities, growing flowers and vegetables on site. At our drop-in center, a ceramics workshop is available where clients can produce a variety of poured ceramic objects for their own use, for sale, or as gifts.

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