The Community Mental Health Association of Michigan (CMHA) held its 20th
Walk a Mile in My Shoes Rally on Tuesday, September 17th. For the past 20 years, the rally has congregated advocates from across Michigan to the Michigan State Capitol building in Lansing to support public behavioral health care. The rally highlights the need for increased funding for mental health services, raises awareness of behavioral health needs in health and policy discussions, and reduces stigma about behavioral health.
![]()
Robert Sheehan“Our public relations committee formed this rally 20 years ago, saying we need a way to rally about the issues that face our system, to brag about our system, and to bring person-served clients to the capitol to not only get them politically involved, but to let their diversity and their voice be heard and seen,” says CMHA CEO Robert Sheehan.
Although CMHA hosts the rally, it is powered by clinicians, administrators, allies, and, most prominently, those person-served clients — Michiganders who have received mental health services. It is a platform for people to come together to show their sense of community and solidarity as well as to inform legislators and the public why support and adequate funding for mental health services are needed, beneficial, and significant.
“Eighty percent of our budget is wages, and the demands for these services have gone up, causing wages to go up 17% in the last two years. Our funding has increased two or three percent.” says Sheehan. “House and senate members who are good allies will say, ‘Bob, we gave you the money last year. Why are you back here?’ We reply, ‘We're fighting a forest fire, and you give us a Dixie cup of water every time we ask. We're gonna be back a lot of times to get more Dixie cups because you think somehow that this dollar amount you gave is sufficient, and it is far from sufficient.’”
![]()
Walk a Mile in My Shoes rally participants hoped to help make mental and behavioral health services accessible and combat stigma.
Representation at the rally
Community mental health agencies (CMHs) from all over the state came to the 2024 rally to show support for their clients and friends and to advocate for a stronger mental health system. Counties represented included those with large populations such as Detroit, Wayne, Oakland, and Kent as well as those with smaller populations like Antrim, Newaygo, Ottawa, Muskegon, and Grand Traverse.
“The CMHs often help with the transportation,” says Sheehan. “They also provide some of the support needed for person-served clients to make it to the rally.”
Along with representation, professionals and patients from the counties give speeches and share personal testimonies, using their voices to inform the public and their legislature about the importance of having community mental health support for people in need.
![]()
Regina Salmi“I was really struck by the power of all the folks who spoke, in particular, one person from Muskegon County who was encouraging the people in the crowd. She said, ‘Don't attach shame to what you're experiencing. Here's the journey that we walk, and we're stronger for it,'” says Regina Salmi, 2024 Walk a Mile committee chair and communications director for
Network180, Kent County’s community mental health provider. "That was so powerful.”
The power in numbers and shared message told by the whole group definitely made an impact.
“Treatment has progressed such a great deal that people can get help, and people can live high quality lives and be engaged members of the community,” Salmi says. “That stigma that was created so many decades ago, it prevents people from getting help. There are so many more people who need help than are actually receiving it.”
The Walk continues
Because the CMHA, Michigan’s community mental health agencies, and Michiganders who have benefited from public mental health services have been walking in support of mental and behavioral health services for the past 20 years, some great strides have been made. But the finish line has yet to be reached. Stigma is still prominent even though more people are having conversations about mental and behavioral health.
In addition, a
health care workforce shortage, predicted to continue for the next 10 years, is fueled by high demand, high turnover rates due to stress and burnout, and insufficient income. This workforce shortage is hitting the state’s community mental health agencies hard. Years of
underfunding mental and behavioral health services coupled with inflation exacerbates the need for more and adequate funding. CMHA is in the process of building a survey to establish how many health care job openings there are and will be in the future.
“I’m glad wages are rising, but if you don’t fund it, you can’t meet it, and we’re losing employees because of that,” says Sheehan. “People will do incredibly hard work if you pay them. Gen Z and Gen Y like this work. We just have got to make sure that we pay them so we can compete with non-health-care work.”
The Walk a Mile in My Shoes rally invited Michigan's legislators to stop and reflect on how it feels to be in need of something and not be able to obtain it.
“It's a political rally. It is really serious. Folks are saying, ‘I have a right to be here. I have a right to enjoy my community. I have a right to get a job, to have housing. And it's not a right I'll be denied,’” says Sheehan. “It is really strident. It's not, ‘Please feel sorry for me.’ It’s quite the opposite. They’re saying, ‘I am a member of this community, and I'm going to claim it, not out of anger but out of strength and real, real joy.’”
Monique Bedford is an aspiring journalist, currently freelancing for Issue Media Group publications. She graduated from Oakland University in fall of 2022 with a bachelor's degree in journalism and a minor in Spanish. Monique has experience in solutions journalism, media design, and hosting a radio show. When she's not writing, you can always find her studying different cultures and languages, reading her favorite newspaper, The New York Times, and spending quality time with her friends and family.
Robert Sheehan photo by Doug Coombe.
Photos courtesy CMHA. Regina Salmi photo courtesy subject.
The MI Mental Health series highlights the opportunities that Michigan's children, teens, and adults of all ages have to find the mental health help they need, when and where they need it. It is made possible with funding from the Community Mental Health Association of Michigan, Center for Health and Research Transformation, LifeWays, Mental Health Foundation of West Michigan, Northern Lakes CMH Authority, OnPoint, Sanilac County CMH, St. Clair County CMH, Summit Pointe, and Washtenaw County CMH.