Wednesday, 02 June 2010 03:27

$400,000 in Mental Health Funding Awarded to County

slide3-400000_in_mental_health_funding_awarded_to_county.pngAmador County - The California Mental Health Services Oversight and Accountability Commission on Thursday approved a total of $7,196,161 for mental health services in Amador, Madera, San Francisco, and Sonoma Counties. $417,195 in Prevention and Early Intervention (PEI) funds were approved for Amador County. PEI funds are approved for programs that apply strategies focused on preventing mental illness from becoming severe and disabling. MHSOAC Chair Andrew Poat said, “Our prevention programs will decrease expensive emergency room visits as we provide prevention services to consumers of mental health services. Prevention and Early Intervention funds will keep kids in school, keep families together, and will avoid long term unemployment.” Amador County will use their PEI funds for five projects. Project 4, Promotores de Salud, addresses access issues to mental health services in the Spanish-speaking community. Access will be increased by providing transportation and dealing with language barriers and stigma issues. “We will stop requiring consumers to “fail first” before receiving services and we will move to a “help first” system. Prevention and Early Intervention programs are a new approach to mental health in California. This program is a win for both mental health consumers and taxpayers,” said Poat. $854,297 was approved for Madera County, $4,200,900 was approved for San Francisco County, and $1,723,769 was approved for Sonoma County for Innovation (INN) programs. The funds approved by the MHSOAC for Innovation (INN) purposes will help fund county mental health programs that are “novel, creative, and ingenious” in their mental health approaches. These programs are also being developed within communities in ways that are inclusive and representative. Poat said, “Innovation funds will help to jump start our thinking about how to improve our mental health programs.” The MHSOAC met on Thursday, May 27 at the Radisson Hotel in Sacramento. The California MHSOAC is a 16-member commission charged with the oversight of the Mental Health Services Act (MHSA). The MHSA was approved by California voters in 2004 as Proposition 63 to provide for expanded mental health services in California. Staff Report This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.