PROP 1

Counties in CA receive roughly $10-13 Billion per year to provide mental health services. Roughly one third of that money comes from the Mental Health Services Act, passed by voters in 2004, which added a 1% tax on incomes over $1 Million. 

Prop 1 would borrow $6.38 Billion to expand the act to include substance abuse disorders, as well as put restrictions on the way counties spend the money. Prop 1 would require counties to spend more of their MHSA money on housing and services such as employment assistance and education. It would also allow counties to spend the money on drug and alcohol treatment for people who don't have mental illness.

The text of Prop 1 is complex, but the bulk of the funding ($4.4 Billion) would go to building treatment facilities, including locked psychiatric hospitals. Most of the remaining $2 Billion would go to the state's Homekey Program, which converted hotels to homeless housing during the pandemic. Half of this money would be reserved for people with behavioral health issues and the other half for homeless veterans with mental health or substance abuse problems.

Regardless of political stripe, most people will agree that homelessness is one of the main problems facing the state. The high cost of housing is a major factor, but mental illness and substance abuse are close on its heels. These are the three things targeted by Prop 1, and, even though the legislative analyst says the bond would "reduce statewide homelessness by only a small amount", that small amount is better than nothing. It is the debt we owe for decades of burying our heads in the sand while the problem has grown beyond imagining. $6.4 Billion is a lot, but not dealing with this will cost us more.

Your Political Friend is voting YES.