Newsom Vows Expedited Rollout of Proposition 1 Funds for Mental Health, Substance-Use Treatment Facilities

Local governments and nonprofits will be able to tap into billions of dollars of new funding to house residents with severe behavioral health issues beginning this summer, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced on Tuesday.

Faced with voter discontent over homelessness and entering the final years of his term, Newsom hopes to accelerate the construction of treatment facilities and supportive housing with money created by Proposition 1, a measure narrowly approved by voters in the March primary.

“I’ve never been more enthusiastic about our prospects to actually make a dent and address the issue of what’s happening on the streets and sidewalks in this state than I am today,” Newsom said. “These next two to three years will be transformational.”

The governor announced the plan to expedite funding outside Cordilleras Mental Health Center, a behavioral health treatment facility in Redwood City. Newsom vowed that Proposition 1 will unlock the funding needed to replicate centers like Cordilleras across the state — and he vowed that the state would approve local requests for the voter-approved money faster than it did for a previous housing bond, Proposition 2, in 2018.

“We will quickly approve those plans because we have a new task force and strike team around this, breaking down all of the boxes and bureaucratic hurdles,” Newsom said.

The state Department of Health Care Services has already published bond guidance for nonprofits and local governments hoping to grab a slice of the $4.4 billion Proposition 1 funding dedicated to the construction of behavioral health treatment facilities.

Later this year, the Department of Housing and Community Development and the California Veterans Affairs Agency will publish similar guidance for the other piece of the bond: $2 billion for supportive housing, with half of that amount earmarked for housing for veterans with substance use or mental illness.

Proposition 1 included both the $6.38 billion bond and a reworking of existing mental health spending. Together, the measure represented Newsom’s most ambitious gamble yet that voters would buy into his vision of prioritizing investments for Californians at the intersection of homelessness and behavioral health.

He almost failed.

Despite a heavy spending advantage, Proposition 1 was supported by just over 50% of voters. Conservatives who may have been skeptical about more state spending were overrepresented in the primary electorate. Some Democrats even opposed the housing bond because it funded locked treatment facilities.

But on Tuesday, a woman who only identified herself as Lee spoke in support of the locked facilities. She said her son suffers from severe mental illness and now lives at Cordilleras.

“He tells me he wants the building locked so that nobody can come in off the street and beat him up,” she said.

Lee said before his stay at Cordilleras, her son would often leave less-restrictive housing only to end up walking on nearby highways.

“And of course, when I learned that he had gotten out on one of these times, I was always afraid,” Lee said. “Would he be hit by a truck on the highway? Would I not be able to find him?”