REPORT OF SECRETARY. To the California State Commission in Lunacy. GENTLEMEN: I respectfully submit to your Honorable Commission. the following report for the fifty-eighth and fifty-ninth fiscal years: The most important duty of your Secretary being the supervision of the collection of board accounts due the various State hospitals, I will take that subject up first. It is with gratification that this office is able to report that the collections for the fiscal years under consideration are materially larger than ever before in the history of the State. They were for the fifty-eighth fiscal year. Totaling for the period... $110,925 90 140,774 05 $251,699 95 The largest collections for any preceding fiscal year were $106,541.98, being for the fifty-sixth fiscal year. We believe that the principal reason for the increased collections is that the work of collecting has been systematized, and that while perhaps it may be some years before the total collections of any single fiscal year will surpass that of the fifty-ninth year, yet we are positive that the collections each year will be larger because of the system we are now working under. The collection of transportation charges and county charges in connection with the commitment of the insane also shows corresponding increase during the period covered by this report. Appended to this report are tables showing the collections by months, and the amount to each hospital. TRANSPORTATION CHARGES. In the collection for the State of charges for transporting the insane to the various hospitals, the Commission meets with much complaint from the relatives of the insane who are required to pay the same. Hardly a week goes by without receiving one or more complaints from such relatives to the effect that the bills are exorbitant. The size of these bills in many cases not only renders it difficult to collect them, but also makes it equally difficult to collect the board or maintenance bills for the hospitals. A bill introduced by John W. Stetson, the attorney for this Commission, at the last regular session of the legislature to remedy this matter, was unfortunately reported upon adversely by the Assembly committee to which it was referred. Mr. Stetson's bill provided that attendants of the hospitals should take charge of and convey the insane to the hospitals. The measure would have done away with sheriff fees, materially decreased the cost of transportation in practically every case, saved money to the relatives of insane persons, and also saved the State thousands of dollars annually. DELINQUENT BOARD ACCOUNTS. The amount owing the several hospitals by reason of unpaid maintenance or board bills has been quite materially reduced, but the amount. delinquent is still much larger than it should be. The amount owing the several hospitals on account of unpaid board bills at the close of the fifty-ninth fiscal year was $24,323. The total was reduced $14,534 during that year. It amounted to $38,857 on June 30, 1907. This reduction was caused chiefly by the efficient work done during the year by the secretaries to the various medical superintendents, whose duty it is to collect the board accounts of their respective hospitals. In the past there has been some disposition in certain instances to allow accounts to run for months without special effort to enforce their collection. The Commission's ruling directing each secretary to enforce collection of all overdue accounts, and to insist that no account should, under any circumstances, unless entirely unavoidable, be allowed to run delinquent over six months, and to report to the Commission. monthly as to each such account, as well as to make a monthly statement to this office of bills rendered during the current month, has had its intended effect of increasing hospital receipts and reducing the amount delinquent. The Commission has during the year canceled all of those accounts wherein it was convinced that the payor was utterly unable to pay the bill, and also whenever it was satisfied that the enforcement of a colleetion would result in working a hardship upon the responsible relative of the patient. The Commission deemed it unnecessary to carry this class of accounts; there being practically no hope of ever collecting them, it simply resulted in a waste of time to carry them in the monthly reports. The weeding out of this class of accounts has something to do with reducing the delinquency. EXAMINATION OF BOOKS AND ACCOUNTS OF HOSPITALS. Charles F. Waymire, your assistant secretary, and myself have made the required semiannual examinations of the books and accounts of the secretaries to the medical superintendents of the five State hospitals. and at the Home for Feeble-Minded Children at Eldridge, and found them to be neatly and accurately kept. Vouchers are retained for each expenditure, and a duplicate retained of the receipts given for moneys and property received. The entries of the cash books have, in every instance, agreed with the vouchers and duplicate receipts, and except in isolated instances the entries were properly posted in the ledgers. SALARIES. I would recommend to the Commission that it use its efforts in the next session of the legislature to increase the appropriation for the support of the Commission sufficiently to raise the salaries of the members of the office force of the Commission at Sacramento at least 1211⁄2 per cent. In support of this recommendation I will call attention to the fact that the employees referred to are paid less than the State employees holding positions of similar responsibility; also, that the cost of living has increased at least 12 per cent, and that the salaries of the employees in the home office of the Commission have remained stationary, while the Commission has increased the wages of the various employees of the State hospitals 12 per cent. Totals $16,392 14 $24,910 61 $16,099 59 $5,548 90 $12,359 01 $75,310 25 |