California reaches major milestone in modernizing behavioral healthcare: Proposition 1 goes into effect statewide

“The Behavioral Health Services Act reflects a fundamental shift in how California approaches behavioral health,” said California Health and Human Services Secretary Kim Johnson. “By bringing together prevention, treatment, recovery, housing supports, and workforce investments under a single, coordinated framework, we are building a system that is more connected, more accountable, and better equipped to meet people where they are.”

 What the Behavioral Health Service Act delivers

With the BHSA now in effect, counties are operating under a modernized structure that:

• Integrates planning across all behavioral health funding sources.
• Targets funding for adults, children, and youth with the highest needs and risks including homelessness, justice-involvement, and institutionalization while supporting investments in early intervention.
• Explicitly includes substance use disorder services, including housing supports and field‑based outreach.
• Expands permanent supportive housing for Californians with the most significant behavioral health needs.
• Establishes a statewide, upstream prevention program focused on reducing suicide, mental illness, and substance use disorders.
• Strengthens the behavioral health workforce through coordinated education, training, and recruitment investments.
• Strengthens fiscal oversight by ensuring counties maximize federal funding and coordinate benefits, connecting people to their existing health coverage whenever possible.

Building the foundation

California has spent the past several years preparing for this transition and has achieved significant implementation milestones:

• Through DHCS, California has awarded $4.17 billion through the Proposition 1 Behavioral Health Continuum Infrastructure Program (BHCIP) to support more than 330 behavioral health infrastructure projects. Once completed, these investments are expected to add more than 6,900 residential treatment beds and more than 27,500 outpatient treatment slots, strengthening access to crisis stabilization, residential treatment, outpatient care, and permanent supportive housing across California.
• The Department of Health Care Services (DHCS) supported county readiness by developing the BHSA County Policy Manual, a comprehensive, web-based guide shaped by more than 2,660 public comments that provides counties with policy and implementation guidance. All 58 counties and two eligible cities submitted their draft Integrated Plans on time, outlining how they will deliver housing, substance use disorder treatment, crisis care, prevention, and wraparound services in a transparent, outcomes-driven way.
•  DHCS launched the statewide Behavioral Health Public County Profile, California’s first unified, public-facing tool that brings county behavioral health data together into one easy-to-use place. It is built on data counties are required to report under the BHSA and helps Californians see how counties plan, fund, and deliver behavioral health services.
•  The California Department of Public Health, through extensive statewide and Tribal engagement, developed California’s Population-Based Prevention Program Final Plan, focused on reducing suicide, self-harm, overdose, and behavioral health disparities, with an emphasis on children, youth, and communities disproportionately impacted by inequities.
• To strengthen the behavioral health workforce, the Department of Health Care Access and Information developed the 2026-2030 Workforce Education and Training Plan, securing approval from the California Behavioral Health Planning Council after extensive statewide engagement. The plan embeds equity and lived experience throughout and aligns investments across licensed providers, the peer and non-licensed workforce, career pathways, and long-term recruitment and retention strategies to support counties and providers in meeting complex behavioral health needs.

Looking ahead

This transformation strengthens California’s ability to connect people with the behavioral health care they need, when they need it, while also expanding access to supportive housing and services for those with the most significant needs. Under the BHSA, counties are directing resources toward high-need and complex populations while maintaining robust prevention and early intervention efforts for children and youth.

Together with broad behavioral health reforms, the BHSA supports stronger crisis response, earlier access to services, and a more connected continuum of care, helping reduce the need for emergency and institutional interventions and ensuring people receive support closer to home and earlier in their recovery.

For more information on BHSA policies, stakeholder engagement, and resources visit: