PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- A Senate committee on Tuesday unanimously approved Megan N. Clingham as Rhode Island's new mental health advocate, clearing the way for a vote of the full Senate as early as Thursday.
The confirmation by the Senate Committee on Health and Human Services came eight months after Gov. Lincoln Chafee nominated Clingham to replace H. Reed Cosper, who retired June 2.
Clingham, 46, is a staff lawyer in the Office of the Child Advocate who spent 10 years as an assistant public defender.
Testifying in support of Clingham's nomination were Anne M.C. Travers, chief of the juvenile division of the state public defender's office; Susan C. Jacobsen, executive director of the Mental Health Association of Rhode Island, and Alan B. Feinstein, a clinical psychologist and former supervisor at the state Department of Corrections.