by Patrick Appel
A reader writes:
Deinstitutionalization did began during the Reagan administration. However it was during his 1966-1974 terms as Governor of California. Liberal Californians wanted to move mentally ill people from institutions to community-based care, which conservatives went along with as a cost-cutting measure, but conservatives blocked spending on the community-based care (helped tremendously in 1978 by the passage of Prop 13, which has created fiscal chaos at all levels of government in California for 30 years).
The Dish 