Half a Billion Dollars for Housing and Services for People Experiencing Severe Mental Illness and Substance Abuse

SACRAMENTO — Gov. Newsom’s press release stated it bluntly, “the nation is experiencing a mental health crisis.”

California, June 21, announced $518.5 million in grants to help provide services and housing options to those with severe mental illness or substance abuse problems, including for those who are living on the streets. The latest funding will help Gov. Newsom’s CARE Court proposal, taking a new approach to homelessness and taking stronger action to get people off the streets and into a place where they can get the care they need.

The funding will provide treatment beds for more than 1,000 people at a time, plus behavioral health services for many more. It is part of a $2.2 billion effort to expand mental health housing and services across California, especially for people experiencing homelessness.

The Governor’s meeting in Sacramento with members of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) included families who are caring for loved ones struggling with behavioral  or mental health disorders and could be helped by CARE Court. The Governor heard their stories and talked about the historic actions that California is taking to address this crisis. 

CARE Court will provide Californians suffering from untreated schizophrenia spectrum and other psychotic disorders with community-based treatment, services, and housing, and is intended to serve as an upstream intervention for the most severely impaired Californians.

The awards announced today are delivered through the Department of Health Care Services’ or DHCS Behavioral Health Continuum Infrastructure Program (BHCIP) Round 3: Launch Ready grants. In all, $2.2 billion was provided by the Legislature and the Governor to construct, acquire, and expand behavioral health facilities and community- based care options while investing in mobile crisis infrastructure. 

LA County received $155,172,811 in grants. 

Grants were awarded in the following counties:

• Alameda County – $18,405,122
• El Dorado County – $2,852,182
• Humboldt County – $4,170,560
• Kern County – $3,138,065
• Madera County – $2,035,512
• Mendocino County – $7,711,800
• Monterey County – $3,558,670
• Nevada County – $4,458,799
• Orange County – $10,000,000
• Placer County – $6,519,015
• Riverside County – $103,181,728
• Sacramento County – $30,553,889
• San Diego County – $30,874,411
• San Francisco County – $6,750,000
• Santa Barbara County – $2,914,224
• Santa Clara County – $54,074,660
• Solano County – $14,332,411
• Sonoma County – $9,751,915
• Stanislaus County – $33,369,900
• Yolo County – $12,500,000

Recipients of BHCIP Launch Ready grants include cities, counties, Tribal entities, nonprofits and for-profit organizations statewide that serve target populations. Additional information on BHCIP Round: 3 Launch Ready awardees is available at BHCIP Grant Award Information.

The next round of funding will include more than $480 million focused on children and youth behavioral health issues. Awards will be made this fall.

Details: BHCIP grant information